Mumbai News

Mumbai: BMC chief orders probe into revenue loss owing to non-recovery of fire service fees – Times of India

Iqbal Chahal

Mumbai: After a nudge from Mumbai Police’s Economic Offences Wing (EOW), the BMC has ordered a probe into the revenue loss caused by the fire brigade’s failure to recover fire service fees from builders and annual fees from residents since 2014 .
BMC chief Iqbal Chahal last week directed the enquiry department to conduct a preliminary probe against top fire officials. “The municipal commissioner has approved the inquiry against fire officials,” said a senior civic official. “The enquiry officer has been asked to conduct a preliminary inquiry. Based on the report, a decision will be taken on whether or not to conduct a full-fledged departmental enquiry against the then chief fire officer and his deputies.”
Following a complaint by BJP corporator Vinod Mishra, the EOW, last month, had in a letter to Chahal asked him to take necessary action in the failure to recover fire service and annual fees.
“Joint municipal commissioner Ramesh Pawar had himself, in an internal note in October 2020, said that there must be an inquiry and responsibility should be fixed for the revenue loss to the BMC to the tune of hundreds of crores.,” said Mishra. “We welcome the probe, but want it to be conducted by an additional municipal commissioner rank officer since the officials involved have already been promoted and can’t be investigated by enquiry officers,” he said. He also threatened to move the Bombay high court and Lokayukta if his demand for a high-level probe is not met.
Additional municipal commissioner (eastern suburbs) Ashwini Bhide did not reply to a query from TOI on the issue.
In May, Chahal had sancti-oned the recovery of fire service fees, which is calculated at Rs 10-15 per sq m for all buildings. The annual charge is 1% per year of the total fire se-rvice fee amount. On June 7, the fire brigade had issued a circular to recover around Rs 1,400 crore as one-time fire se-rvice fees from builders and annual fees from housing societies retrospectively since 2014. But the proposal for fee recovery was stayed by the civic standing committee following protests by corporators.

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Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/mumbai-bmc-chief-orders-probe-into-revenue-loss-owing-to-non-recovery-of-fire-service-fees/articleshow/85547401.cms