The Madras High Court today closed a contempt petition filed by social Activist Traffic Ramaswamy seeking a direction to demolish all buildings in George Town area which are in dilapidated condition.
The First Bench, comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice Pushpa Sathyanarayana, before which the petition came up, recorded the submission of the Government Pleader STS Moorthy that police officials will render all necessary assistance for corporation officials to perform their duties in taking up demolition of such buildings.
The matter relates to a PIL filed by Ramaswamy to demolish old and 'worst condition' buildings in the George Town area to avoid collapse of such buildings and save lives of people.
Ramaswamy further prayed the Court to direct The Commissioner, Corporation of Chennai, The Commissioner of Police, Greater Chennai City, The Additional Commissioner of Police, Traffic, Chennai City to consider his representation with regard to providing proper protection to owners and corporation officials engaging in such demolition
The bench on October 7 last had directed the Corporation officials to carry out demolition of such buildings where the owners had expressed their willingness to pay for the demolition.It had directed officials to co-ordinate the matter with police who would provide adequate protection on advance notice being served by municipal authorities.
Stating that the authorities had willfully disobeyed the orders of the court in carrying out the demolition work, Ramaswamy filed the contempt petition.
When the petition came up, Counsel for the Corporation of Chennai submitted that number of buildings in the George Town area were very old and in very dangerous condition.
The bench said nothing further has happened despite the October 7 order.
While referring to the grievance of Counsel for Corporation of Chennai that rather than assisting Corporation officials, police end up harassing them, the bench posed a question to the government pleader for which he assured that police will render necessary assistance.
After recording the assurance and submission made by the Counsel for Corporation that efforts would be made to complete the exercise within a period of three months from today, the court closed the contempt petition.
