‘Ahmedabad owes its growth to taxes paid by public’

Presenting the budget on Thursday, standing committee chairman Bhupendra Patel said that the city's development was a result of taxes paid by its residents. The municipal budget has been planned with an aim to provide basic facilities to the citizens.

This budget covers 446 sq km area of the city targeting 55 lakh citizens and aims to provide them basic infrastructure facilities. This budget is a statement of amounts assigned to projects announced by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Patel said. The AMC budget for 2012-13 has been set at Rs4,511 crore, up from Rs1,097 crore in 2003-04.  

This year's budget aims to fund construction of four new overbridges, an elevated corridor, 100 new traffic junctions, and renovation of eight halls, a new community hall in Khokhra, 14-storey state-of-the-art medical hostel in Maninagar, ladies' hostel in west zone, children's park, urban housing and plantation along SP Ring Road.

For the central zone, AMC will spend Rs10 crore for Health Bhavan at Gita Mandir ST bus-stand. A new hostel for women will come up in west zone and south zone which will cost the exchequer Rs1 crore each.  

DI pipe network has been planned in new west zone for Rs11 crore. An additional Rs80 lakh will be spent on garden development in Jodhpur ward.