Justice Amrita Sinha of Calcutta High Court on Tuesday issued an order directing New Town Kolkata Development Authority (NKDA) to identify illegal party offices, which are alleged to have been constructed by members of the ruling Trinamul Congress on either pavements or vacant plots in New Town.
The order followed a petition by some local residents claiming that Trinamul Congress has constructed party offices on land owned by Housing and Infrastructure Development Corporation (Hidco).
The petitioners have attached photographs of the constructions with their petition and have sought a direction from the court to the authorities for demolition of the alleged unauthorised constructions.
The NKDA and the local police had opposed the prayer. Both the NKDA and the New Town police stated before the court that they had not received any complaints in this regard yet.
While the petitioner had pointed to at least three such constructions — near Pride Plaza hotel, on a green verge near Bisarjan Ghat and on a road opposite Sukhobrishti — the advocate representing NKDA said two could not be located, claiming street no.303 in DE Block and street no.143 in BA Block did not exist.
At this, the judge ordered that in case it was difficult for the authority to identify the structures, it would be open for NKDA to communicate with the advocate representing the petitioner for identification of the unauthorised structures.
The judge asked the NKDA to file a status report before the court after verification of the constructions in question. A similar report has also been sought from Hidco.
The New Town police station has been directed to monitor that no political activity takes place in those structures if they are found to be without a sanctioned building plan.
The matter will come up for hearing before the court on May 10, when the NKDA, the Hidco and the police will have to file their reports.
The case was filed last week. “In a smart city, each plot is earmarked for a certain use. I am a representative of a national political party. I have written to Hidco, seeking to buy a 2.5 cottah plot of land to build a party office. With the number of voters increasing in the township, political activities will also have to grow. But the letter has not been even been responded to while government land is being encroached upon with impunity. During the panchayat elections, these structures were used for illegal gathering of outsiders who disrupted the polling process. We apprehend they might be put to the same use for the Lok Sabha polls as well,” alleged Saptarshi Deb, the petitioner.
