Kolkata, October 21 (UNI) Calcutta High Court will hear a string of petitions seeking modification to its Monday’s order, banning entry of visitors into puja pandals.

Swaswata Basu, spokesman of Forum for Durgotsav, one of the petitoners, said,“The order passed by this court yesterday has put our clubs in a lot of problem. Since the court passed the order without hearing the clubs, we want some modifications to it.”

According to Monday’s order, areas within 10 metres of a big pandal and 5 metres of a small pandal will be barricaded as “no-entry zones”.

The idol can be viewed from 10 metres “beyond the furthest extremities of the pandal” on any side at big pujas, and from 5 metres at smaller pujas.

Depending on the scale of the puja, only 15 to 25 organisers, including the priests and dhak players, will be allowed within the no-entry zone on all puja days.

Puja organisers have complained about several aspects of the order, including how they will put up a barricade at 10 metres from the pandal without blocking roads and how they will choose 25 persons who will be allowed inside the pandals.

“The court wanted to decongest pandals and felt prohibiting entry into pandals would discourage many revelers from stepping out amid the covid-19 pandemic,” a club member said.

“The virus refuses to go away…. In such a situation, it may be judicious to err on the side of prevention than to allow the festivities to go on without any checks and repent later that adequate resources may not be available to provide for the massive cure that may become necessary,” the division bench of Justices Sanjib Banerjee and Arijit Banerjee had said in its order on Monday.

The order came on a PIL filed by advocate Saurav Chatterjee who expressed fear that festivities might lead to a surge in covid-19 cases..

UNI XC-AND