Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (SP)

Bengaluru, Jul 3: The state high court once again expressed its anger at the failure of the state government to evict unauthorised religious centres, and also for coming up with excuses. It questioned the government why the decade-old Supreme Court order on the issue and various orders issued by the high court thereafter are not being executed.

The high court has ordered the chief secretary of the government and Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike to file separate affidavits explaining steps taken to meet the orders of the courts.

The Supreme Court, through an order passed in 2009, had ordered to vacate religious centres that have come up on the roads, street sides, parks and other public places. The suo moto public interest litigation registered by the high court on its own came up before the division bench comprising Chief Justice A S Oka and Justice Suraj Govindaraj.

When the BBMP advocate said that only three centres have been evicted and most of the officials are on Covid duty, the court pointed out that as per BBMP's own admission, there are over 1,890 religious places that are unauthorised. It said that out of them, 105 need to be shifted, 240 buildings cannot be tolerated, a few can be regularised and the balance 277 need to be evicted. It said that if only three centres have so far been vacated, it may have to order the personal presence of the corporation commissioner.