Parmesh S Jain
Prima facie evidences found the ACB officials during the raid and search on the 33 offices of the BBMP in three zones across the city found that large scale irregularities and from the documentary verification it was estimated sum of Rs 300 crore has not been collected by the officials towards the advertisement revenue, incurring huge loss to the BBMP and the state exchequer.
Senior ACB official said in a release,the BBMP officials concerned have not collected the advertisement taxes from bus stands and skywalks and also from the newly constructed bus stop under PPP model.
At the TDR section,the town planning section officials allegedly committed large scale irregularities in fixing TDR and created fake records to claim TDR.
In many instances sanctioned excess TDRs for many projects.The officials also created fake documents to claim the compensation for the road widening projects .
Even the internal vigilance section headed by engineer has not acted on the report submitted to him about the irregularities
The ACB officials also found that the town planning officials have sanctioned the building plan to construct multi storeyed apartments at the lakes bed and buffer zone.The officials also approved the land records submitted to them illegally .
Even many under construction residential buildings across the city have issued OC (Occupancy Certificates),A three storeyed building plan was later converted into a six storeyed building and approved by the officials.
A 10 storeyed building and building constructed on two acres or more have been approved despite having many violations and the tax rate has been fixed to minimal causing huge revenue loss to BBMP and the state exchequer.
The officials of the BBMP revenue department have fixed minimum tax on the residential buildings, multi-storeyed residential complexes and even commercial complexes and IT companies .
The Revenue officials have fixed old tax rates to the newly constructed buildings and complexes causing revenue loss to the BBMP to the tune of several crores.
According to the rough estimation a total sum of Rs 217 crore loss was calculated and the ACB officials have seized seven files pertaining to the details of the tax irregularities have been seized for further probe .
Storm water drain section :The ACB officials seized unaccounted Rs.1.18 lakh cash from the office of the Assistant Executive engineer .
The officials also seized records pertaining to a Rs.1050 crore for various projects and desilting work which was awarded to only a few contractors since the year 2017.
Even at the solid waste management section a bill of Rs 100 crore was created and sanctioned to the beneficiaries but no action has been taken against the official concerned.
Even at the accounts and finance section of the BBMP even though there was no project,the officials created fake documents and released the amount.
The tender process has not been done as per the rules and violation of transparency act.
While the raid and searches were on,many private firms and individuals rushed to the office to pay their dues.
A total of Rs 15 crore has been paid toward the taxes since the past two days,the ACB officials said .
As many as 200 officials took part in the operation which was launched three days ago .
