New Delhi, November 24
Even as the issue of trifurcation of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) received the final nod from the union home ministry yesterday, Delhi Mayor Rajni Abbi said the division would lead to mismatch between revenue and expenditure.

Prof Abbi said the creation of the East Delhi Municipal Corporation was not a viable decision. "The maximum mismatch will be in east Delhi where the revenue generation is very less while the expenditure is more as the area is a densely populated due to unauthorised development. This will leave people to suffer and there are many chances that they would be left out from the developmental activities," said Prof Abbi.

Shahdara north and south are the two zones that will comprise the East Delhi Municipal Corporation. In the property tax collection, which is the major source of revenue for a civic body, the two zones lag far behind when compared to the others. Till November 22, the property tax collection in Shahdara (north) was Rs 265.67 lakh only from 8,598 tax payers.

Likewise, only Rs 1,962.96 lakh was collected as property tax in Shahdara (south) zone.

However, the MCD during the period has collected a total of Rs 1,082.29 crore while the two zones in combination have collected just over Rs 22 crore.

"The huge gap only shows that the revenue generation in the East Delhi Municipal Corporation would be a challenge, hampering not only developmental activities in the area, but also depriving the citizens from welfare programmes. Out of this proportion of collection of property tax, the proposed East Delhi Municipal Corporation will not be able to give the salary of the employees in the new set up," she said.

The MCD leaders said it was notwithstanding the fact that two zones of the MCD in the Trans-Yamuna area contributed to only 10 per cent of the income from the property tax, whereas more than 1/3 of the Delhi's population lived there.

Najafgarh, which is the largest of the MCD zones, contributes to 2.97 per cent of income and the second largest Narela contributes to 2.12 per cent of income.

"In the present set up, the imbalance in income is taken care of by pooling together of the entire income of the MCD in one kitty and spending it as per the needs of the area. In the proposed set up, one or two corporations will flourish and thrive, whereas there will be much lesser income for the remaining corporations, mainly the East Delhi Municipal Corporation.

It will adversely affect the development process," Prof Abbi added.

New Delhi, November 24
The Delhi cabinet today approved a proposal for a two-day special session of Delhi Assembly beginning from November 30 to pass a Bill on the trifurcation of Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), a proposal cleared by the Centre on Wednesday.

Speaking to media persons, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said that during the two-day session, the Bill to trifurcate the MCD, the second largest corporation in Asia after Tokyo, will be passed. The trifurcation is being done to ensure better delivery of civic services and improve the corporation's functioning.

She reiterated that the new civic bodies in North and South Delhi will have 104 wards each while the civic body in East Delhi will have 64 wards and a directorate of municipal services would be set up to coordinate functioning of the three bodies. This is also mentioned in the proposal cleared by the Union home ministry.

The proposal lying with the home ministry and law ministry was signed yesterday by home minister P Chidambaram.

The Chief Minister reiterated that with the approval of Bill by the Assembly, reservation for women seats in the MCD House would be enhanced from 33 per cent to 50 per cent.

The procedure to trifurcate the MCD is to be competed by January as in February, the state election commission is likely to issue notification for civic polls in early April.

New Delhi, November 24
Delhi University's first innings at conducting exams under the new semester system did not go all well. The first day was marked by a number of goofs and clarifications that left the students in a fix. Yesterday evening, Facebook became the venting spot for all the teachers, as they posted the faux pas they had witnessed on the first day of examinations.

The comments have been coming in on the website with fellow professors reacting to the issue.

Vineeta Chandra, faculty (English) at Ramjas College, posted an angry comment on the social networking website, citing a case of absolute anarchy in the middle of the exam.

"The Reading Gandhi paper in lieu of Qualifying Language came to all the exam centres and printed on top was that it is a 50 mark paper for two hours. We all know that the DU website says all the concurrent courses will be three hours and 100 marks, but ours is not to question why, so we just wondered and invigilated. At 11.15 am, the college received a notification from the university, saying that the paper should be three hours and 75 marks and students should do one more question. Most of the students had handed in their papers and left and so there was no question of giving the rest that extra hour. I guess this is what they mean by teething problems, except that for these students their teeth are gone forever!" said an agitated Chandra on Facebook.

Professor of physics Naveen Kaur posted: "The same thing happened with the theory exams of B.Sc (Hons.) Physics III practical. We got a paper of 15 marks and 45 minutes duration. The paper was over at 9.45 am and around 10.45 am, we got a fax from DU that this paper was of 20 marks and one-hour duration and students had to attempt 20 questions instead of 15. When the principal made an enquiry to the examination branch, they stated that we need to re-scale the marks."

Kaur further said, "So the simple solution is scale everything. Then why to have so many problems…just examine students for one paper and scale them for all the papers. Simple. The students will not be taxed; the preparation of results would be extremely quick."

Greater Noida, November 24
Builders who have upcoming projects in the area have been asked by the Greater Noida authority to pay enhanced compensation to the farmers within the next three months.

In a meeting with the developers, each of whom is now required to pay an extra Rs 2,015 per sq mt, the authority officials said that the notices will be sent out by November 25 and the builders will have to pay their share of the extra amount by January 2012. The developers have been given the option to pay this amount in three instalments.

It has been decided that the developers will deposit their first instalment with the authority by the end of this month so that the authority can begin disbursing the enhanced compensation to the farmers at the earliest.

There are about 95 developers, with upcoming projects in the 38 villages across Greater Noida area, who will now have to share the burden of enhanced compensation. However, a decision on whether the 30,000 individual plot owners will also have to pay an extra amount will be taken during the authority's board meeting on Friday.

Earlier, there were indications that the individual allottees will have to pay anywhere between 15 and 20 per cent more to the authority.

However, officials said a final decision will be taken at the authority's next board meeting.

New Delhi, November 24
The Delhi High Court today issued contempt notices to the Delhi government, Delhi Development Authority (DDA) and the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) for non-compliance of its order to implement the provision of a law that prohibits throwing of garbage and other objects on the Yamuna bed or at public places in the city. Justice Vipin Sanghi sought their replies by February 7.

The court was hearing a petition filed by Vinod Kumar Jain that in 2006 the court had directed the government, MCD and the DDA to take adequate steps to prohibit throwing of garbage and other objects on the river bed, drain sewer, etc.

The court later directed the authorities to implement in totality the Delhi Plastic Bag (manufacture, sales and usage) and Non-Biodegradable Garbage (control) Act, 2000, and its further amendments in 2005.

"Accordingly, the government identified 13 sites near the river bed to throw the same. But till date it is still under process due to which the garbage is thrown in the river," said the petition.

"The respondents have neglected to perform their duties to prevent pollution of the river and have, therefore, willfuly and knowingly disobeyed the orders passed by this court in 2006," said Jain, adding that all committed contempt of court and are liable to proceedings against them. - IANS