A Vacation Bench of the Supreme Court on Thursday refused to entertain complaints about alleged lack of will on the part of the civic authorities to continue with the sealing drive against unauthorised constructions in the Capital.
A Bench of Justices U.U. Lalit and Deepak Gupta said the case is pending before the Green Bench — a combination of Justices Madan B. Lokur and Gupta — and they should hear the issues linked to the sealing drive.
Two reports have been filed by the Supreme Court-appointed monitoring committee, which said that agencies, including the South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC), have refused to carry out the sealing drive on the grounds that amendments in the Master Plan of Delhi-2021 were not finalised yet.
Mixed land use
The SDMC also said that the issue of notifying mixed-land use along 351 roads was pending in the apex court, the report stated. Justice Lalit also observed that the Delhi government’s application on the issue relating to notifying mixed-land use along 351 roads was under consideration by Justice Lokur’s Bench, which had heard the application last on May 15 asked the monitoring committee to file its reply. The case was posted for hearing on July 11. The move of notifying mixed-land use along 351 roads is intended to avoid sealing drive against commercial establishments along these roads.
Amicus curiae and senior advocate Ranjit Kumar said the committee had asked the officials concerned to carry out sealing in their respective areas, but they refused to do so saying government had asked them not to proceed till amendments in Master Plan of Delhi-2021 were finalised.