Remove encroachments in Mani Majra motor market: High Court

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has directed the Municipal Corporation of Chandigarh to remove any encroachments found in the Mani Majra motor market. The Bench of Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Sumeet Goel made it clear that the due process of law was required to be followed while carrying out the procedure.

The Bench also called for a compliance report on March 27 –– the next date of hearing in the matter. The matter was brought to the High Court’s notice by advocate Devansh Khanna, who appeared in person before the Bench in the petition against UT and other respondents.

He was, among other things, seeking directions to the respondents to take immediate steps for removing encroachments in the Mani Majra motor market as it was causing “a lot of nuisance and inconvenience to the public at large”. He added it was also raising “serious safety and health related concerns” for local residents, shopkeepers, vendors and mechanics.

Khanna also submitted that Article 21 of the Constitution of India guaranteed fundamental right to life. In broader terms, the right to life also included pliable roads for movement from one place to another. “If such sort of chaos remains in the market due to the illegal encroachment, it endangers the life of every commuter plying on the road,” he added.

Khanna added that every municipal corporation had a statutory obligation to ensure free flow of traffic and to have the encroachment removed, especially the ones which were a constant source of “unhygienic ecology”, traffic hazard, a risk to the lives of the people residing in the vicinity and even the visitors.

Khanna added the questions of law requiring adjudication by the Bench were whether the non-removal of the encroachment by the respondents was violative of Article 21 of the Indian Constitution, “which encompassed in itself the right to safe, secure, hygienic and encroachment-free street”, and whether “manifest injustice” had been caused to the public at large due to the illegal encroachment in the motor market.

“Another issue for consideration by the court was whether the inaction by the authorities on the petitioner’s representations sustainable in the eyes of the law,” he added.