Uttar Pradesh development authorities record 175% surge in earnings

The sale of housing properties, including flats, generated almost 50 per cent of the earnings in Uttar Pradesh

The state development authorities collectively posted a 175 per cent increase in earnings during the financial year 2023-24 (FY24) to more than Rs 12,700 crore.

The sale of housing properties, including flats, generated almost 50 per cent of the earnings.

According to government sources, the Uttar Pradesh Avas Vikas Parishad (UP Housing Board) accounted for the maximum revenue of Rs 3,757 crore or 30 per cent of the earnings by the different development authorities.

Lucknow Development Authority (LDA) earned more than Rs 1,700 crore, followed by Bareilly Development Authority (Rs 1,078 crore), Ghaziabad Development Authority (Rs 820 crore), and Kanpur Development Authority (Rs 771 crore) 

Even as the development authorities pushed their revenues, they also cut down their expenditure by over 5 per cent, which further boosted their kitties.

Meanwhile, the UP Housing Board and the various development authorities spent Rs 3,000 crore on different civil and construction projects.

During a review meeting last year, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had asked the development bodies to find new ways to generate income for balanced development.

At another forum, the CM underlined that the government departments should create new sources of tax and non-tax revenues, including a concerted effort for augmenting the GST and value added tax (VAT) collection.

He emphasised on the periodic review of the targets assigned to field officers in the revenue generating wings/departments.

In the state annual budget 2024-25, the Yogi government projected receipts of Rs 7.21 trillion, including revenue and capital receipts of Rs 6.06 trillion and Rs 1.15 trillion, respectively.

In fact, the state municipal corporations are also toeing the line of augmenting their coffers through better realisation and employing modern technology to plug leakages.

The revenue collection of top 17 cities in the state surged 33 per cent to Rs 3,100 crore.

The 17 municipal corporations include Lucknow, Kanpur, Varanasi, Ghaziabad, Agra, Gorakhpur, Prayagraj, Aligarh, Meerut, Jhansi, Ayodhya, Mathura, Bareilly, Saharanpur, Shahjahanpur, Moradabad, and Firozabad.

Compared to the composite tax and non-tax kitty of Rs 2,340 crore by 17 municipal corporations in 2022-23, the revenues jumped by Rs 761 crore to Rs 3,100 crore in 2023-24.

While Lucknow and Kanpur municipal corporations topped with revenues of Rs 904 crore and Rs 534 crore respectively, Ghaziabad, Prayagraj, and Agra followed with collections of Rs 350 crore, Rs 253 crore, and Rs 215 crore respectively.