LMC starts making new list of religious places

LUCKNOW : After the Allahabad high court sought a response from the Additional Solicitor General of India and the Uttar Pradesh government on behalf of the Centre on a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed for the removal of religious places from railway stations, roads, parks and other public places located in Uttar Pradesh, the Lucknow Municipal Corporation (LMC) has started making a new list of religious places at railway stations, roads, parks and other public places.

The high court order was passed by a division bench of Chief Justice Rajesh Bindal and Justice JJ Munir on the petition of Jan Uddhav Seva Sansthan and five others on Thursday.

The petition said other railway stations of the state, including Kanpur and Lucknow, also have “Mazaars” along the tracks and in the middle. Such constructions in public places can cause accidents and hence they should be removed, the petition said.

Chief engineer, LMC, Mahesh Chandra Varma said , “The counting and survey of religious places started on Friday and the final report on the number of religious places on public places in the city would be out by Saturday evening.”

He said LMC had got the religious structures on public land counted in 2016 too when in April that year the Supreme Court had come down heavily on the states for not removing encroachments from public roads. In its order the apex court had stated that the unauthorised religious structures on roads and near drains were an insult to the God.

In 2016, a report was prepared by the engineering department of LMC and at that time there were 347 religious places on public places, parks, roads, streets, drains and footpaths inside municipal limits. According to that report, 169 religious places were situated inside parks, 30 of them were on footpaths, two on nullahs and drains and 146 on roads disturbing traffic flow.

Additional municipal commissioner Pankaj Singh said, “This year, there is a possibility that religious places on public land might have increased because 88 more villages have been added to municipal limits. On Friday, LMC surveyors counted 170 old structures in 40% of city areas. Rest of the survey would be completed on Saturday.”

“There are some old Mazaars like those built at Lucknow railway station. There are religious structures in Hazratganj old Kotwali, Valmiki Marg, Sugarcane Institute, Dalibagh, Gokhale Marg, GPO Park, near Bapu Bhawan, Aminabad Kabrawali road, Gurugovind Singh Marg, Naka Chauraha, River Bank Colony, near divisional commissioner office, RK Tandon Road, Shriram Road , Ghantaghar Road, Jhandewala Park, Aminabad, Cantt Road, Shahnajaf Road, Niyamat Ulla Road, Vishal Block, Gomti Nagar and Vikrant Khand,” he said.

Chief engineer, LMC, Mahesh Chandra Varma said, “We will remove any encroachment, if directed by the government.”