The Bombay High Court on Wednesday ordered BJP MLA Ashish Shelar to deposit a sum of Rs 5 lakh as security.
The division bench of Justice Dipankar Dutta and Justice GS Kulkarni passed this order while hearing a PIL filed by Shelar.
During the hearing of the PIL, the lawyer representing the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), Dr Sathe, raised preliminary objections on the maintainability of the PIL. According to him, the petitioner’s personal interest had been affected by the impugned action of the BMC. The petitioner has sought to raise a grievance by filing the PIL.
The Court ordered, “We exercise power conferred by Rule 7A of the Bombay High Court Public Interest Litigation Rules, 2010 and direct the petitioner to deposit, as security, a sum of Rs 5,00,000. Let the deposit of security be made within a period of seven days from date.”
According to PIL rules, such a petition cannot be filed for any personal gain or personal motive. The security amount is taken by the court to ensure that if the PIL is filed for personal purposes, the amount will go towards the cost of litigation.
Last Year, MLA Ashish Shelar had filed the PIL seeking to streamline medicines, disinfectants and sanitizers for Covid-19 to prevent profiteering of some people. The PIL claimed that disinfectant procurement by public hospitals should be of the highest standards to ensure the safety of the common people, especially the economically deprived sections of the society.
The PIL had alleged that BMC had failed to develop a proper framework for procurement of medicines and disinfectants through a tender process in line with the norms applicable to civilian hospitals. The PIL will now be heard on March 31.