Delhi High Court asks chief secretary to decide representation on collecting data on senior citizens

New Delhi: The Delhi High Court has asked the Delhi chief secretary to decide a representation for directions to conduct a door-to-door survey for ascertaining the number of senior citizens in the city and to construct homes for the elderly in every district.

The high court said the petition seeking the directions be treated as a representation which shall be decided expeditiously, preferably within 12 weeks.

“This court directs the present writ petition to be treated as a representation to the Chief Secretary, Delhi government, who, in turn, is directed to decide the same in accordance with law, as expeditiously as possible, preferably within twelve (12) weeks," a bench of Acting Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Manmeet PS Arora said.

The court passed the order while disposing of the petition filed by Salek Chand Jain, who also sought the court’s direction to the Delhi Police to maintain a separate data of offences being committed against senior citizens.

Advocate Dinesh P Rajbhar, appearing for the petitioner, submitted that at present there are only two government-run or aided old age homes in Delhi.

One is at Bindapur, which is being run by the Delhi government on Private-Public Partnership (PPP) model, and another at Lampur that is funded by the Delhi government, he said.

The counsel said another senior citizens home is run by the Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board (DUSIB).

He submitted that senior citizens are neglected and discriminated against by their own families and they need special care, love and affection.

The petitioner said he made several representations to the authorities but they did not take any decision, prompting him to move the court.