BENGALURU: The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday asked the BBMP to remove all the illegal structures that are installed to support advertisement hoardings in the city. The court also directed the state to submit the response on an application filed by a petitioner about illegal banners and hoardings displayed near Vidhana Soudha by various government agencies to celebrate an event.
This direction was issued by the division bench of Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice Pradeep Singh Yerur after hearing a batch of PIL petitions in relation to illegal hoardings and banners.
The court also asked the BBMP to submit the total number of illegal hoardings and banners displayed in the city and the measures it is going to take to prevent the same. These directions were issued after the BBMP’s counsel informed the court that there are 1,806 illegal structures in the city.
These structures were not removed as the advertisement tax is due from the agencies, it said. To this the court said that unpaid tax cannot be a reason for not removing the illegal structures.