LIT approves surplus budget of Rs 147.05 crore

Kuldip Bhatia

Ludhiana, May 25

The Ludhiana Improvement Trust (LIT) has approved a surplus annual budget of Rs147.05 crore for the current financial year. The Trust has shown a surplus of Rs9.94 crore over an annual expenditure of Rs137.11 crore during the year.

The annual budget was approved in a meeting of LIT presided over by Chairman Balwinder Singh Dhaliwal. Executive Officer Kuljit Kaur and Accounts Officer Ripan Kakkar were also present in the meeting.

In the budget proposal, biggest source of income was projected from the sale of properties (Rs99.82 crore), cess (Rs16.40 crore), fines and penalty (Rs7 crore), recovery from Municipal Corporation, Ludhiana (Rs7.06 crore), recovery from Punjab Water Supply and Sewerage Board (Rs2 crore), recovery from Improvement Trust, Phagwara (Rs3.63 crore), earnest money deposit from contractors (Rs5 crore) and earnest money deposit from applicants (Rs1.45 crore).

On the expenditure side LIT proposed to allocate around 68 per cent (Rs93.11 crore) for development works in various colonies, which would be spent on the maintenance and creation of new infrastructure. The annual salary bill would take Rs12.13 crore, cost of land, Rs2 crore, refund of earnest money, deposit Rs4 crore, PF withdrawal Rs1crore, cess Rs16.40 crore, income tax Rs2 crore and contribution towards construction of Dr BR Ambedkar Bhawan Rs1.75 crore.

If performance of LIT during the last financial year (achievement versus projections) is any indication, the budget estimates seem to be on a very higher side. During the year that has gone by, LIT projected a total income of Rs149.12 crore, while the actual income during the year was just Rs36.28 crore.

During the last year, the sale of properties yielded Rs20.71 crore against budget estimate of Rs100 crore.

Similarly, income from building/ license fee was Rs1.44 crore (projected Rs2 crore), penalty Rs6.66 crore (Rs4.50 crore), earnest money from contractors Rs2.08 crore (Rs5 crore), while total collection from cess was Rs2.10 crore against the budget estimate of Rs25.23 crore.

Interestingly, LIT failed to make any recovery of loans given to Municipal Corporation, Ludhiana (Rs4.52 crore); Municipal Council, Nawanshahr (Rs56.54 lakh); and Improvement Trust, Phagwara (Rs2.35 crore), in the last fiscal.