Supreme Court rejects contempt plea for demolition actions in Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a plea for taking contempt action against senior officers of Uttarakhand, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh governments for demolition of properties.

A bench of Justices B R Gavai, Prashant Kumar Mishra and K V Viswanathan said it was not inclined to entertain the plea filed by the petitioner who was not directly or indirectly related to the alleged act.

"We don't want to open a pandora box," the bench said, adding somebody affected can approach the court not a third party.

Advocate M Nizam Pasha on behalf of National Federation of Indian Women claimed there were three instances where no permission was sought from the court before carrying out the demolition.

Additional Solicitor General K M Nataraj for the governments submitted demolition was on the footpath. He said the plea was filed by the third party on the basis of a news report.

The court said it will hear those affected by the demolition of properties.

The counsel said even journalists who bring out such facts had to suffer consequences. The bench then observed that let the journalists come to the court.

The petitioner alleged that authorities in Haridwar, Jaipur and Kanpur had demolished properties in contempt of the apex court's order which had said that demolitions would not be carried out without its permission.

On October 1, the apex court extended its September 17 order prohibiting the use of bulldozers by states for demolition of the property of an accused in a criminal case, without permission of the court.

The court, however, had then exempted action involving encroachments on public roads, footpaths, railway lines, or water bodies.

The court had then reserved its judgment on laying down guidelines for bulldozer action.

On September 2, the Supreme Court had said it would lay down pan-India guidelines to deal with a controversial issue of "Bulldozer justice" resorted to by some state governments to demolish the house or shop of a person immediately after he or she is accused of an offence.