Madras High Court dismisses PIL against demolition of community hall

The Madras High Court has dismissed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) seeking a direction for inquiry about the demolition of the public community hall at Ward No.7, Sundarapuram Ahraharam Street, Manamadurai Municipality, Sivangangai District.

The PIL has been filed by one M. Rajasekaran. The petitioner-in-person submitted that without following procedure, the community hall was demolished and therefore, a direction for an inquiry has been sought. The petitioner-in-person is unable to refer to the procedure given under the law and alleged that it has not been followed.

In view of the above, the Division Bench of Chief Justice Munishwar Nath Bhandari and Justice S. Ananthi noted that the public interest litigation seems to have been filed for the sake of it.

The Court further noted that not only administrative sanction for the demolition was accorded, but a report of the Engineer giving the reasons to demolish the building was obtained, wherein the observations are as under:-

“OBSERVATIONS:

1. The investigated building is an RCC framed structure of size 33mx16m with 24 columns.
2. The building consists of series of single bay RCC frames (a beam supported by two columns) supporting the RCC one way slabs.
3. The main bars of all the columns have been heavily corroded. Most of the cover concrete portion of the columns at bottom are spalled off. The upper and middle portion of the columns show heavy corrosion cracks near the cover-bar interface. Main bars located at exterior face of the column have undergone a large extent of corrosion such that only few portion of the material remain.
4. The Plinth beams are also undergone a heavy corrosion to an extent that almost all of the rebar materials are corroded away at the exterior face.
5. The basement structure and columns are highly corroded beyond the stage of any further repair and rehabilitation measures.”

Since the expert had given the observations as aforesaid, the building was demolished after taking administrative approval. Thus, the Court did not find any reason to send for inquiry when the condition of the building as such required an action in the matter.