Allahabad: In an urgent hearing on Sunday, the Allahabad High Court stayed the demolition of a clinic and a restaurant, which the local civic body was planning to demolish in order to create a dedicated corridor to the Prayagraj Airport.
The court also directed the authorities concerned to specify how the petitioners had encroached upon the land and why it required demolition, by the next hearing, which is fixed for February 24.
The bench comprising Justice Pritinker Diwaker and Justice Ashutosh Srivastava passed the order on a petition filed by Rakesh Gupta and two others.
The petitioners said they were in possession of the plot, the homeopathy clinic and the restaurant for 100 years. They said their property had been allotted a house number and it was being assessed for taxes by the Nagar Nigam.
According to the petitioner, the High Court had in a public interest litigation filed in 2019, directed the removal of all encroachments leading to various colonies on the Kanpur road and obstructing the proposed dedicated corridor to the Prayagraj Airport.
However, the authorities of the Prayagraj Development Authority, in the garb of a demolition drive, are trying to demolish the constructions raised by the petitioners, their plea alleged.
Further, they contended that due to the rise in COVID-19 cases, the High Court by its order dated January 11, 2022, had passed general orders, putting in abeyance till February 28 all the orders of eviction, dispossession or demolition already passed by it, the district courts and the civil courts, if not already executed.
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