The Madras High Court has directed the Monitoring Committee appointed by it pursuant to its August 23 2006 order to go into the menace of unauthorized constructions to meet at least once in 15 days for taking suitable action.
The First Bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice M Sathyanarayanan stated this recently while disposing of a petition by one M G Devasahayam, an IAS officer, seeking a direction to Chief Secretary, Government of Tamil Nadu, Chennai Metropolitan development Authority and the Commissioner, Corporation of Chennai, to call for an emergency meeting of the committee as also to implement its decisions.
The petitioner alleged that the committee had met way back on January 4 2013, after which no meeting was held.
Stressing the need for regular meetings,the bench said "It cannot be seriously disputed that the menace of unauthorized construction has not been rectified, but continues unabated. Thus, the continuing activity of the monitoring committee is of utmost importance.
The bench noted that initially there were frequent meetings and checks. But over time, it was relaxing. Apparently no frequency of the meetings to be held was provided in the final order, possibly expecting the committee would do so on its own. Since this had not happened, it was necessary to provide for the frequency of the meetings.
"We thus direct that the meetings should be held by The Monitoring Committee at least once in 15 days for taking suitable action," the bench said.
It also directed the committee to submit a summary of what had happened till now in pursuance of its directions on Aug 23 2006, what steps had been taken to stem the problem of unauthorized construction thereafter and what measures have been taken now after passing the order.
The bench also directed that the report be filed within a maximum period of two months from today and posted the matter for compliance on December 23 2014.
