The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad high court has directed the administrative and municipal authorities to remove remaining illegal encroachments from the district and sessions court premises in Lucknow and its surrounding areas.
The bench directed the district magistrate, the police commissioner and the municipal commissioner of Lucknow to coordinate and ensure adequate administrative and police assistance to the municipal authorities during the drive while ensuring that no law and order situation arises. A division bench of Justice Rajesh Singh Chauhan and Justice Rajeev Bharati passed the order on September 10 while hearing two connected petitions concerning alleged encroachments around the district and sessions court premises and other public areas in Lucknow. The matter has been listed for the next hearing on October 26.
The bench, however, clarified that the removal exercise is not yet over. The court asked the authorities to complete the exercise within five weeks if possible. The bench had stated that if they failed to do so, the illegal encroachments could be demolished.
The court noted that pursuant to its earlier orders, 14 illegal constructions were initially removed and subsequently 57 illegal encroachments were removed. The zonal officer of Zone-1 of the Lucknow Municipal Corporation submitted a report dated September 8, along with photographs of the removed encroachments. In its earlier order, the court had directed that 72 remaining alleged encroachers be given one more opportunity either to vacate the chambers/shops or to apprise the competent authority of their valid claim to hold them. The court had further directed that if notices could not be served, they should be published in a Hindi and an English daily, giving the affected persons at least 10 days to respond.
