CHENNAI: The burial site of former Chief Minister and AIADMK general secretary J Jayalalithaa is within the Coastal Regulation Zone-II, where buildings are permitted on the landward side of the existing roads or on the landward side of existing authorised structures.
The Tamil Development and Information department stated this in its counter affidavit filed in response to a PIL petition from ‘Traffic’ KR Ramaswamy on Monday. And the first bench of Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice Abdul Quddhose posted the matter to February 16 for further hearing.The PIL sought a direction to the authorities to re-locate the memorials of former CMs CN Annadurai, MG Ramachandran and that of Jayalalithaa on the Marina to Gandhi Mandapam in Guindy to protect the coastal zones.
In its counter, the department submitted that the government took a conscious decision with regard to establishment of memorials, after considering the importance of the leaders, whose contributions had led to the uplift of the people. The CRZ notification was issued by the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests for regulation of activities in the coastal areas. The memorials of Anna and MGR were constructed much prior to the promulgation of the CRZ notification in 1991 and hence there was no violation of the notification, it said.
The prohibited activities were listed under the 2011 CRZ notification, wherein construction of memorial was not a prohibited activity. Further, as per the amendment issued to the notification dated February 17, 2015, construction of memorials (based on scientific studies) even in inter-tidal zone was a permissible activity. However, the burial site of former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa was falling under the CRZ-II, where buildings shall be permitted on the landward side of the existing road or on the landward side of existing authorised structures.
Further, buildings were permitted on the landward side of the existing and proposed roads or existing structures shall be subject to the existing local Town and Country Planning regulations as modified from time to time, except the floor space index or floor area ratio, which shall be as per the 1991 level.