New Delhi, Nov 24 (PTI) Lack of maintenance of theRajghat, a memorial to Mahatma Gandhi, and insufficient publicfacilities like drinking water and toilets, today shocked theDelhi High Court which ordered an immediate inspection of thesite and its restoration.
A bench of Acting Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice CHari Shankar said the memorial to the Father of the Nation wasvisited by people from across the world and it deserves to berespected and maintained properly.
The bench even pulled up the Rajghat Samadhi Committee,entrusted with maintaining the memorial, and the CentralPublic Works Department (CPWD), saying even if they were notaware of the problems earlier, once the PIL was filed, how didthey fail to perform their statutory duties.
"We (the court) are not here to direct you (authorities),how to maintain toilets and issue directions to carry out therepair and maintenance works," it said, adding it was theirstatutory duty to preserve and protect the sacred place.
It ordered immediate inspection of the site and directedthe CPWD chief engineer to personally visit the place andpoint out the deficiencies. It asked the chief engineer tosubmit a detailed status report with regard to the work neededto be done to protect the memorial.
"Emergent steps to be undertaken to ensure that the workidentified shall be done," the bench said and sought thedetails from the authorities by the next date of hearing onDecember 4.
The court was hearing a public interest litigation (PIL)alleging that the monument set up in the memory of MahatmaGandhi was not being properly maintained.
Petitioner, Shyam Narayan Chouksey has claimed that thesamadhi of Gandhi "was not at all being properly and cleanlymaintained", and despite being brought to the notice of theCommittee and Ministry of Urban Development (MoUD), there hasbeen no change in the situation.
The Committee, however, refuted the allegations and saidthat CPWD was responsible for its upkeep. It had earlierclaimed before the court that the samadhi and its premiseswere well-maintained.
In the PIL filed through advocates Abhinav Shrivastava,Chouksey submitted photos of various deficiencies that he hadcome across during his visit to the monument in 2014 and thenagain in 2015 and 2016, when he claimed the situation hadworsened.
Referring to deficiencies, he has alleged there are betelstains at the entrance, broken floor tiles, rubbish lying allaround and closer to the monument, the white marble has goneblack due to lack of cleaning while the green carpet laid forvisitors to walk is damaged.
Even the two toilets were in very poor condition andunclean and at many places sewage lines are exposed and filledwith garbage, becoming "breeding place for mosquitoes andother insects". PTI PPS SKV HMPARC.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.
