CHANDIGARH: Pointing out that a need arises for stepping in as it is in the public interest of residents of Chandigarh and the Tricity itself so that it grows to its full potential, the Punjab and Haryana high court has taken up suo motu cognizance of a slew of civic and other matters plaguing the city for a while.
A division bench of Justice G S Sandhawali and Justice Rajesh Bhardwaj has sought solution to long-pending issues like public transport in the form of mono rail or Metro, malba dumping in green belts and discharge of sewage into N-choe, while issuing notices to the central government and the UT administration.
Pankaj Jain, the senior standing counsel for the UT, accepted the notice on behalf of the administration.
The court has appointed Amit Jhanji, newly designated senior advocate, as pro bono counsel to assist it.
“…Amicus curiae make periodic visits to various sites being referred..
and give his report as to the inaction of the administration and place the same before the court, so that more issues can also be redressed which have escaped the notice of this court.
Accordingly, the matter be placed before the requisite division bench by taking appropriate orders from the Chief Justice,” according to the order.
In a reprimand of the administration, the order said, “The UT suffers from futuristic long-term development plans on account of the administration being headed by a bureaucracy posted on deputation for short periods of 2 to 3 years.
The elected representatives are only the mayor, who holds office for one year on rotation, and a sole MP.
The town suffers from planned infrastructural projects coming up though it has to host a large number of visitors who come to the city daily on account of it being the capital…..” The court has also questioned whether the city required a public transport system in the form of mono rail or Metro that would seamlessly connect inflow from adjoining towns of Kalka-Parwanoo in the north, Yamunanagar on the north eastern side, Ambala on the southern side, Patiala on the south western side, Sirhind, Fatehgarh Sahib and Kharar on the western side and Nawanshahr, Ropar on the north-western side, to help reduce traffic from highways that comes into the city from all four sides.
On the present infrastructure in Chandigarh, the high court has asked, “ Whether the infrastructure provided by the state has grown in proportion to the growth of the town from sectors 30 to 50 or whether the administration is not able to deal with the problems on account of adequate resources in the form of manpower and as to what was the cadre strength of appointments for the administration 40 years earlier and whether augmentation has been done thereafter… and whether sufficient regular persons are available to take the town forward to regain the status of City Beautiful.” The high court has sought reply of the administration as to why Rajindra Park not be developed as a forest area by planting renowned species of trees, creating walkways and pathways on the patterns of the Forest Institute at Dehradun to augment the green cover.
The court has asked what steps the administration was taking to avoid the area from being converted into a dumping zone by residents of Khuda Ali Sher.
“Why should the lake road/Uttar Marg, which is blocked at the entrance at the tum of Punjab Engineering College and Khuda Ali Sher, be not opened to facilitate the ready movement for persons commuting to the secretariat and the high court who have to come in a roundabout manner between Sector 11 and 2 to approach the institutes?” The court has also asked what is the statistical data of living trees and dead trees and what steps were taken to ensure that they were felled on time to prevent danger to pedestrians and residents.
No underpass at high-density points “Despite various recommendations for the last more than two decades, the city has no traffic underpass at high-density traffic points like the transport chowk and the government press light points.
Now another pedestrian underpass is proposed at PGI without any thought for future planning for vehicular underpasses for seamless traffic movement.” People commuting 60km, but no public transport system “In spite of the fact that people are commuting on daily basis as far as 60 km for example from Patiala, Nawanshahr, Kalka, Ambala and Sirhind, no effort is being made for long-term planning of public transport system in sync with Punjab and Haryana, whose capital it is, which would effectively and seamlessly connect these states by some high speed rail track/subway/” No one is accountable Every time proposals come through, but are jammed up in technical studies on footfall viabilities of projects and no one is accountable for seeing or pushing through the need of the hour of the town, leading to future decay ‘Short-term thinking pedestrian underpass cost city Rs 9cr’ The high court has said, “The solitary underpass built in in 1960s between sectors 11 and 15 has not been replicated in any other portion of the city by the administration and has led to chaos on account of the highest car ratio in the country… whereas short-term thinking of having a pedestrian underpass, which has cost the city a huge amount of Rs 9 crore and is grossly underutilized to the extent of having not more than 200 pedestrians using it, has been put in place.”