MUMBAI: The Bombay high court on Tuesday directed the state chief secretary to reply about compliances made to orders passed in a suo motu public interest litigation on the poor condition of roads across Maharashtra.
A bench of Justices Amjad Sayed and S G Dige heard contempt petition filed in 2019 by advocate Ruju Thakker regarding wilful non-compliance of February 24/April 12, 2018 orders. Her petition said that “most roads in Mumbai, including arterial roads, have developed potholes.”
“This is statewide and not only confined to the city of Bombay (sic). The state has not bothered to reply. We are here to assist the court as citizens,” argued senior advocate Janak Dwarkadas for Thakker. He said the HC, besides holding that it was the statutory duty of authorities to maintain good roads, had imposed a further duty on the state government to set up a centralised grievance redressal mechanism and file quarterly reports. This was in addition to grievance mechanisms for municipal corporations and councils . “As far as we know, it is non-existent, not working and nobody is able to access it. There are people dying because of potholes. Pregnant women have lost children…The taxpayer is paying taxes to get this at the end of the day,” said Dwarkadas. He added that had the orders “been complied with rather than observed in breach, we would not see what we are seeing.”
Dwarkadas referred to BMC’s reply that it has complied with the orders. “Corporation wants us to believe there are no potholes in the city. On a daily basis, there are 900 potholes whether you are travelling from western or eastern express highways. The condition of roads is pathetic. What has the state done to hold any body accountable?” he asked.
The judges enquired if there is a grievance mechanism for Mumbai. Dwarkadas replied that “there is an app (by BMC) and we have listed the difficulties faced to access it.” He urged that a responsible officer of the state file an affidavit on compliances. The judges then directed the chief secretary to file the affidavit and the advocate general to appear in the matter.
