Court tells MC to draw yellow lines in organised manner

Legal Correspondent

Shimla, October 16

The HP High Court has directed the Commissioner, Municipal Corporation, Shimla, to personally visit the Boileauganj market and ensure that all yellow lines drawn (to create parking space) are removed immediately. It further directed that fresh yellow lines should be drawn, only at places where there was free flow of traffic on both sides of the road.

While passing the order, Justice Tarlok Singh Chauhan further stated that there should be no hindrance in the movement of vehicles to and fro in the Boileaganj Bazar and no yellow line should be drawn near the bus stop and the same be removed forthwith.

During the course of hearing, it was brought to the notice of the court by advocate Jagdish Thakur that the Municipal Corporation had marked yellow lines at various places in the city in an unorganised manner, that too, without taking into account the narrowness of the passage. He further pointed out that even recently, yellow lines had been marked near the main gate of the Boileauganj police station and in the main market, which was creating problems in the flow of traffic. Such marking of yellow lines in an unorganised manner was contrary to the directions passed by the court from time to time.

Meanwhile, the court also directed the MC commissioner to depute an official not below the rank of junior engineer so as to identify all such bottlenecks within the MC area, where the yellow lines had been drawn, and file a report in this regard by the next date of hearing. The matter was listed for further hearing on November 6.

The court passed the order on a contempt petition filed by Deepak Gupta, who alleged that despite court orders, the local authorities were not complying with the directions of the court.