CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has directed the Nilgiris District Forest Officer S Ramasubramanian and Collector Archana Patnaik to appear in court for their alleged disobedience of the orders passed by it earlier.A division bench comprising Justices Elipe Dharma Rao and M Venugopal gave the direction on Monday, while taking on file a contempt application from S Jayachandran of Finger Post in Udhagamandalam, seeking to punish the duo for their wilful disobedience of the court orders. The duo were to appear before the judges on June 4.According to advocate M Santhanaraman, counsel for petitioner, who is also honorary secretary of Nilgiris Wildlife and Environment Association, writ petitions were filed challenging the validity of a GO dated August 31, 2010. By an order dated April 17 last year, a division bench of the HC had upheld its validity relating to acquisition of land for an elephant corridor.The court had directed the occupants to hand over the land to the government in three months. It had also ordered the removal of unauthorised electric fences in the corridor. While so, the duo had ratified the sale deeds executed by some private individuals in violation of the TNPPF Act, that too in the area earmarked for the corridor in the August 31 GO, which had already been upheld by the HC and had not been stayed in its entirety by the Supreme Court. Further, despite the directions given by the HC to remove the electric fences, the duo had not taken any step to implement the same.
Comments
0 comment