CHANDIGARH, March 18: The Chandigarh Municipal Corporation (MC) failed to claim ₹32 crore in compensation from the administration for land acquired from Maloya gram panchayat over two decades ago, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) has revealed in a report.
The oversight comes as the civic body grapples with a financial crunch, delaying staff salaries for the past three months and stalling development projects since May 2024.
According to the report, the Chandigarh administration transferred 23 villages to the MC in phases between 1996 and 2018, including Maloya. As part of the arrangement, the MC was responsible for developing these villages and generating revenue through property taxes, building plan approvals, and compensation for acquired land. However, during a review of MC records, the CAG found that the civic body never claimed ₹32 crore for the Maloya land.
The report stated that the dates of possession and demarcation for the acquired land were missing from MC records. Consequently, between 1996 and 2024, the civic body neither determined the exact compensation amount nor made efforts to collect it.
In 2004, the land acquisition officer deposited ₹7.05 crore in the administration’s Punjab National Bank (PNB) account, while the remaining amount was submitted in court, as mandated by law after a certain period. The CAG estimated that the ₹7.05 crore would have grown to over ₹20 crore with interest over the past 20 years.
Currently, the principal amount of ₹32 crore remains unclaimed—₹25 crore in court and ₹7 crore in the bank. The MC has made no effort to retrieve the funds in 28 years, the report noted.
Repeated attempts to contact MC commissioner Amit Kumar for a comment went unanswered.
The civic body’s ongoing financial struggles have resulted in unpaid salaries, pension delays, and mounting liabilities, including water and electricity bills, maintenance works, and fuel expenses.
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