Highlighting the difficulty of the common people due to the absence of public transport to commute from Ghaziabad to the national capital, a PIL was filed in the Delhi High Court seeking a direction to the state governments to allow public transport on National Highway no 24.
The plea was filed by Mohan Singh, a Vaishali resident, through counsel T V George, which said NH 24 is the only route connecting Ghaziabad with Delhi and sought the court to direct the city government and UP to allow public transport.
"Direct the respondents(govts) to undertake the process of reviewing the list of routes under the Reciprocal Common Transport Agreement, 2008 keeping in view the development of residential colonies in Ghaziabad region of NCR."
A bench of Chief Justice N V Ramana and Justice Pradeep Nandrajog admitted the plea and said a detailed order with direction to the government would be passed later.
According to the plea, "because of the absence of public transport buses, people are compelled to use private vehicles for the purpose of commuting from Ghaziabad to Delhi and vice-versa, which in turn causes a lot of vehicular pollution causing serious health hazards."
The petitioner's counsel argued it was the duty of the state to provide a healthy and better quality of life to its people and sought the court's order to both the governments to review the agreement and include this route in its list in Reciprocal Common Transport Agreement(RCTA).
"Direct the competent authorities of both the states to include NH 24 bypass in the list of routes mentioned in RCTA and grant permit to allow public transport buses on the said routes.
