HC orders traffic police to count speed breakers
The Delhi High Court on Wednesday directed the municipal corporations, Traffic Police and other civic agencies to visit each road in the national capital and count the total number of speed breakers.
The court’s direction came after the Delhi Traffic Police informed it that there were only 93 authorised speed breakers on roads built by the Public Works Department in the capital.
A bench of justices S Ravindra Bhat and Yogesh Khanna also directed the agencies to identify potholes, manholes and other such breaks which exist on Delhi roads and file their reports.
The court noted that the traffic police has identified 93 speed breakers on main roads but could not ascertain the exact position with regard to roads in interior areas like colonies.
The bench directed that chief engineers of the three municipal corporations and the special commissioner of police shall work in coordination and identify the actual position of speed breakers.
It issued similar directions to the New Delhi Municipal Council, the Delhi Development Authority, the Delhi Cantonment, the Public Works Department and the DSIIDC (Delhi State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation).
The court said the authorities will earmark local officers and policemen in the area and they should jointly visit each road and report the correct status.
They should also give measurement of speed breakers as well as differentiate the authorised and unauthorised ones, it said.
The court asked the agencies to file progress reports by August 16, the next date of hearing.
Advocate Naushad Ahmed Khan, appearing for the traffic police, told the court that proper signages have been placed on the 93 speed breakers, which have been made as per norms of the Indian Road Congress (IRC) and the Unified Traffic and Transportation Infrastructure (Planning and Engineering) Centre (UTTIPEC), on the peripheral roads here.
The court was hearing two PILs filed against unauthorised construction of speed breakers on city roads without complying with the guidelines of IRC and UTTIPEC.
The court had in May and August last year directed the agencies maintaining roads in the national capital for removal of all speed breakers not approved by the traffic police and which do not conform to the prescribed norms. Thereafter, it had told the traffic police that all speed breakers on Delhi roads must be geotagged and their location marked by GPS.
The Delhi Development Authority (DDA) will develop three major markets in South Delhi-- Nehru Place, Bhikaji Cama Place and Basant Lok Market.
The development work will involve repairing facade of buildings, creating a separate zone for eateries, renovating pavements and construction of toilets. The work is likely to begin in the next two-months.
The Union urban development ministry has approved the projects and the DDA has also got the no-objection certificate from the South Delhi Municipal Corporation, which is the land owning authority of these markets.
A senior official of the DDA said it is not the mandate of DDA to develop these markets but the department took this initiative as the corporation was not maintaining it properly.
The department will first develop Nehru Place followed by Bhikaji Cama Place and then Basant Lok Market.
According to a rough estimate, around Rs 80 crore has been allocated for the three projects.
In Nehru place several hawkers run food stalls for which they use gas cylinders and kerosene stoves without arrangement of water or fire extinguisher.
There are more than 1,300 business establishments in Nehru Place including offices, shops and eateries—making it one of the busiest commercial hubs in the city. Due to lack of enough pubic urinals, people could be seen using the spaces next to buildings in the plaza for relieving themselves.
Spread over an area of 35 acres, Bhikaji Cama Place comprises commercial and government offices, small and mid-sized retailers, hotels and several computer shops.
The area was developed by DDA in late 1970s and the only major renovation work was done in 2006. Since then no attention has been given for the upgradation of the complex. The pathways are unusually high for a walker and are broken at many places.
“As we are inclined to think that a woman, who has already become a destitute being sexually assaulted and suffering from a serious medical ailment, not to go through further sufferings. The quintessential purpose of life, be it a man or a woman, is the dignity of life and all efforts are to be made to sustain it,” the bench said, fixing May 8 to hear the matter again. The court also allowed member of NGO Koshish-TISS to accompany the woman to Delhi. This was after her lawyer Vrinda Grover informed the bench that the victim was under the organisation’s care at Shanti Kutir shelter home.
Grover told HT that the case at hand is a glaring example of how the authorities can mess up a case of medical emergency. Divorced and left to fend for herself on the streets of Patna, the woman approached the top court after the Patna high court did not permit her to terminate her pregnancy.
The woman was not even aware of her pregnancy and the disease until the government authorities picked her up from the streets and admitted her to the shelter home on January 27.
“As per the procedure she underwent a medical test and learnt that she was 17 weeks pregnant. She told the doctors to abort the foetus. However, the hospital insisted on calling her father who too gave his consent,” Grover said. Since the hospital did not respond, the woman moved the HC. At that time her pregnancy was between 20 and 21 weeks. The court set-up a medical board that held the woman was suffering from minor mental retardation. Grover said the board made no categorical statement on whether the termination could happen and, yet, the HC presumed that termination would be hazardous to the petitioner’s life.
“The HC ordered the woman’s father to pay ₹1,000 every month to her. It even summoned her erstwhile husband who admitted to have left her 12 years ago and is now remarried. He too was asked to give the woman a monthly maintenance of ~1,500,” Grover said, questioning the basis of the HC judgement.