The Uttarakhand High Court has directed the State’s Chief Secretary to provide the court with a list of illegally constructed religious structures in all districts of the State within one week.
If the State administration is unable to provide this list, the court has directed the Chief Secretary to appear in the court on March 4. The division bench of chief justice Ramesh Ranganathan and justice RC Khulbe issued this direction while hearing on a petition filed against religious structures built illegally after encroaching on public places and Government land in the State.
Hearing the petition, the high court observed with dissatisfaction that the Supreme Court had issued orders in 2009 directing all the States to remove religious structures built on public places and Government land.
Despite this, the Uttarakhand Government has not acted upon the orders of the apex court so far. It is pertinent to mention here that taking suo moto cognisance of religious structures built illegally on public places, the high court took up the matter of removal of illegal religious structures on the public lands as a public interest litigation. It has been mentioned in the petition that despite the orders of the Supreme Court, temples, Mosques, Churches and Gurudwaras built illegally on public land have not been removed by the Government.