Ruchika M Khanna
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, February 16
The urban local bodies (ULBs) and panchayati raj institutions (PRIs) need to be empowered financially and through building their capacities. The Punjab Government should give the local bodies their due share in taxes and allow these to raise their own too.
Three provisions
- First, via share of net taxes collected by the state (4 per cent is to be given) — 70% rural areas and 30% urban bodies
- Second, the assignment of certain taxes in part or whole
- Finally, the widening of the tax base of these bodies themselves
These should be allowed to expand their tax base for collecting property tax and explore options for collecting pollution tax, sanitation tax and advertisement tax.
Considering that the state’s own tax net is shrinking post GST rollout, the only way forward will be expanding the
tax net, imposing new taxes and cutting down on expenditure.
These are the suggestions given by representatives of various local bodies to the Sixth Punjab Finance Commission, headed by former Chief Secretary KR Lakhanpal. The commission is considering these suggestions so as to strengthen the local bodies and make these entities, said Lakhanpal, in an interview with The Tribune here today.
“We are not restricting our scope to giving the ULBs and PRIs grants, which may be larger than what was previously given by the other commissions. What is more important is what is happening to the growth trajectory of the state government and in turn how it is affecting the PRIs and ULBs. Thus, we are talking to all stakeholders, especially after the report of the Union Finance Commission is released. We know about the grants Punjab will get, after the recommendations of the Sixth Pay Commission are received and action taken on the recommendations of the pay commission,” he said, adding that it was because of the delay in submission of these two reports that they would take a few more months before they submit their own report.
Lakhanpal told The Tribune that mere transfer of resources to these bodies would be of little avail unless the structural issues faced by these are sorted out. Most important structural issue is the political consensus between all political parties on whether they intend to make these bodies self-governing entities.
“This cannot come from bureaucrats or commissions. Because the principle of this is very sanguine ndash; the principle is that the government should be closer to the people. That is why you need to make these local and rural governments powerful – financially and capacity wise,” he said.
The chairman said barring Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Telangana, West Bengal, Gujarat and Maharashtra, other states have failed to build up strong ULBs and PRIs.
Civic bodies, PRIs seek more financial powers
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