New Delhi, Feb 7 (PTI) The Delhi High Court on Monday refused to entertain a petition by an NGO challenging the Delhi Fire Service’s report on a mock fire drill conducted in the Nehru Place area pursuant to its order and said the plea was a gross abuse of the process of the court.
A bench of Justices Manmohan and Navin Chawla stated that filing of a fresh petition to challenge an affidavit filed by Delhi Fire Service (DFS) in a separate pending matter was not permissible in law and it resulted in the multiplicity of proceedings.
The mock drill was ordered by the court while dealing with its suo motu case concerning a fire that broke out in a building at Nehru Place last year. The report had claimed that neither the fire engine nor the ambulance could reach the place where the fire broke out and thus recommended that the area be made a hawker-free zone.
Lawyer Indira Unninayar, appearing for the petitioner Manushi Sangathan, contended that the report was vague, misleading, and baseless and asserted that there was a video to show that there was no obstruction by the hawkers and in fact, the fire tenders reached the site in question on the date of the drill. In its petition, the NGO contended that “there have been repeated unlawful attempts by the traders and various government bodies to exclude hawkers and street vendors from Nehru Place District Centre”.
The court remarked that “this sort of mistrust is not good for anyone” and that there was no reason to believe that the counsel for the Delhi government would not have brought all the facts to its notice on its turn.
“I’m sure Delhi government will show us everything… These are good people, good organisations. You write to Mr Gautam Narayan (Delhi government counsel), he will examine it. No institution is against you. We are examining this issue from a larger public. DFS has nothing against you,” said Justice Manmohan.
“What makes you think that each and everyone is against you? This approach has to go. You can’t have a coloured vision,” he told the petitioner.
The court observed that the main case was yet to be concluded and it was hearing all stakeholders, including the hawkers, in the suo motu proceedings.
“We may be doing something wrong here but you have remedies. You cannot mount an independent writ petition,” the court remarked.
“It is an abuse of process of the court. Everyone -– NGO or not NGO — has to follow the rule of law… This is total anarchy,” it said.
The petition was dismissed as withdrawn by the court after the counsel for the petitioner NGO sought permission to withdraw.
Last year, the high court had initiated a PIL on its own after taking note of an incident of fire in a building at Nehru Place, District Commercial Centre.
It had stated that the enormity of the problem caused by hawkers and vendors at the Nehru Place area, which could be seen from a video circulated on social media, showed that it was difficult for the fire tenders to access the building where the fire broke out.
The report of a mock fire drill, which was conducted in September 2021, had said that neither the fire engine nor the ambulance could reach the place where the fire broke out, asserting that while none of the vehicles could reach the place where the fire took place, fire tenders could only reach up to the upper plaza and the lower plaza was not reachable.
It had informed that the time taken by the first fire unit was 11 minutes which indicated the existence of significant hindrances due to heavy pedestrian movement, heavy traffic, hawkers, and parking problems.PTI ADS RKS RKS
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