New Delhi, September 11
Warning the Uttar Pradesh government against "playing with fire," the Supreme Court today directed the state to immediately stop work at Kanshiram and other memorials and statues at Lucknow and evict all workforce, excepting the watch and ward staff, within six hours.
Taking suo motu notice of media reports that the Mayawati government was going ahead with the construction activity and flouting its own undertaking to the apex court on September 8 to stop work, a Bench comprising Justices BN Agarwal and Aftab Alam issued show-cause notice to Chief Secretary Atul Kumar Gupta.
“We have no other option but to record a formal order that all activities of all manner and kind — construction, repair or maintenance — shall be stopped forthwith at all the construction sites covered by the previous order of this court. All the construction sites shall be vacated and the entire workforce excepting the watch and ward staff evicted by 7 pm," the Bench said.
Apparently referring to the demolition of the Babri Masjid at Ayodhya on December 6, 1992, despite the undertaking given to the apex court by
the then Kalyan Singh government for maintenance of status quo, the Bench said this was not the first time the state had flouted the court order.
Clarifying that it decided to take up this matter suo motu following the “disturbing news reports,” the Bench also asked two newspapers and a television channel, which were among the media houses which had reported the ongoing work, to produce all the material they had along with their affidavits.
Minutes after the Bench passed the order, the Forest Bench headed by Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan issued notice to the UP government on the report of the court-appointed Central Empowered Committee (CEC) that another memorial coming up at Noida, a satellite city of Delhi, did not have environmental clearance. The Forest Bench, which included Justices SH Kapadia and Alam, however rejected the plea for a stay on further construction or an early hearing by next week. Posting the matter for October 9, the court asked the state to file its response by then.
Accepting the state’s assurance on September 8, the Bench of Justices Agarwal and Alam had rejected the contention that the court had no jurisdiction to review projects approved by the state assembly and the Cabinet. The judiciary had powers to scrutinise expenditure involving tax money collected from the public, particularly in a state like UP which had an abysmal economic growth rate of two per cent, the Bench had clarified.
