The Hindu : `CMDA petition should have been posted before division bench'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, May 31, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

`CMDA petition should have been posted before division bench'

By Our Staff Reporter

CHENNAI MAY 30. The Centre has faulted the Madras High Court Registry for posting a writ petition, filed by the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority, against its notification on the Coastal Regulatory Zone, before a single judge instead of a division bench.

(On May 27, Justice P. Sathasivam, vacation judge, stayed the operation of the notification and posted it for June 25, to be heard along with the main petitions relating to the Queen Mary's College demolition issue, pending before the First Bench).

Filing a petition to vacate the stay, the Joint Director of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests, A. Senthil, said as per a Supreme Court order a Green Bench had been constituted in the Madras High Court to hear environment and pollution control cases.

"It is inexplicable how the writ petition was posted before the single judge. The petition should have been posted before a division bench of the court. It is, therefore, necessary that the present application to vacate the stay needs to be heard by a division bench even during vacation sittings, and there is absolutely no urgency to deviate from the said practice".

The petition, moved by the Additional Central Government Standing Counsel, P. Wilson, also stated that the impugned notification had an `all-India applicability' and was passed in view of large-scale destruction of mangroves and exploitation of coastal zones for commercial interests along the over 6,000 km coastal line. Stating that the stay would render buildings of archaeological and heritage significance liable for demolition, the petitioner said there was an urgent need to vacate the injunction.

Justifying the notification, which effectively prohibited State Governments from taking up demolition or reconstruction activities involving structures of public use on the CRZ-II, the petitioner said the move was necessitated as actions of various State Governments were not in consonance with the intention and purpose of the CRZ regime.

He sought the dismissal of the petition at the admission stage itself and said the civic agency had no locus standi to plead mala fides in the Central notification, when "neither its member-secretary nor the Authority he serves has any grievance. It is clear, therefore, that this plea has been taken at the behest of someone else".

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