The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Collector asked to comply with court orders

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Thursday, May 29, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Collector asked to comply with court orders

Special Correspondent

With regard to erecting hoardings in Coimbatore

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has ordered that the Coimbatore Collector and the Commissioner, Coimbatore Corporation, should comply with the earlier orders passed by the First Bench in August 2006 and also the Supreme Court’s judgment in April this year with regard to hoardings in letter and spirit.

Disposing of a batch of writ petitions challenging the authorities action in removing or attempting to remove hoardings, a vacation Division Bench comprising Justices K. Venkataraman and M. Sathyanarayanan said if the petitioners had filed any valid application for grant of licences or renewal of licences in time, the Coimbatore District Collector should dispose of them within four weeks.

Till the said consideration, the hoardings in question may not be removed.

The Bench said if the petitioners had obtained licence from the competent authorities for erecting hoardings as per the Tamil Nadu District Municipalities Act and rules framed under the Tamil Nadu Urban Local Bodies Licensing of Hoardings and Levy and Collection of Advertisement Tax Rules, 2003, they should not be disturbed, except after due notice and after hearing their grievance.

Refixing hoardings already removed could not be permitted at this stage. In those cases, if the petitioners had filed valid applications for grant of licence, the same should be processed within four weeks. Till the said consideration, the iron structures should not be removed by the authorities concerned, if they were otherwise not hazardous and dangerous.

The Bench said though the petitioners’ submission was that permission had been granted by the authorities and in spite of that the hoardings were removed or an attempt was made to remove them, in almost all the writ petitions, it saw that the petitioners had not filed any proof to show that permission had been given for displaying the hoardings.

The petitioners merely relied on the receipts issued by the authorities for collection of tax.

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