Maharashtra govt seeks performance review of revenue recovery officials

To increase efficiency of the civic staff responsible for collecting revenue in urban local bodies and to improve recovery, the state government has mandated inclusion of the performance report of employees in the annual confidential report. “The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the state legislative assembly has recommended to include in the confidential report the performance of the staff responsible for revenue collection. Thus, the state government has taken a decision to implement it,” said government resolution (GR) on Tuesday.

The urban local bodies collect property and water taxes, among others from residents. Besides mandating inclusion of the performance report, the government has also asked the employees concerned to mention their outstanding performance and the revenue collected during their tenure. If the recovery of revenue is above 90 per cent of the target, the evaluation officer is also asked to comment on the outstanding performance of the staff concerned. In the case of recovery below 70 per cent of the target, a specific mention should be made, stated the GR. The reviewing officer should ensure that the performance evaluation is carried out as per the resolution, it added.

Since the replacement of octroi and local body tax with the Goods and Services Tax, property and water taxes have remained the main source of revenue collection for the urban local bodies. The recovery of property tax has always been disputed in the Pune civic body due to allegations that the civic staff was inefficient and was collecting only 60 per cent of the tax.