A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court on Tuesday restrained the Kochi Corporation from closing down as many as 166 commercial establishments functioning in the residential areas of Panampilly Nagar till the corporation considered their objections and passed an order.
The Bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Mohan M. Shantanagoudar and Justice K.T. Sankaran directed the corporation to consider their objections, if not already heard, in four weeks.
The court issued the directive while disposing of an appeal filed by the owners of the commercial establishments. According to them, they were doing business in the residential areas for more than 10 years. A single judge had appointed an Advocate Commissioner to visit the area and file a report regarding the licence of the establishments. The Advocate Commissioner had found that as many as 246 commercial establishments were functioning without obtaining licences. The corporation then issued notices to the establishments to close down their shops.
The counsel for the corporation submitted that 166 commercial establishments, which had no licence, had filed their objections. The corporation was of the view that the owners who had not filed objections did not have licences to run the shops. Therefore, they were closed down and sealed. However, no action had been taken against the 166 establishments which had filed objections to the notice of the corporation. Except these 166 establishments, all other commercial establishments had been closed down.
The court observed that the appellants should have approached the single judge for impleading them and for vacating the interim order. Instead, they had rushed to the court, questioning the interim order. The court ordered them to be impleaded in the case pending before the single judge.
The court also made it clear that in case the order passed by the Kochi Corporation went against them, it was open for them to take such steps.
The single judge had issued directives on a writ petition filed by Shobha Ramachandran and other residents in the area. They had pointed out that despite the High Court’s earlier interim order restraining the Kochi Corporation and the Greater Cochin Development Authority (GCDA) from issuing permit or licence for converting residential plots into commercial purposes, several new commercial establishments had started operations in the area. In fact, the buildings and plots at Panampilly Nagar were allotted for residential purposes only. The land was assigned under the Detailed Town Planning Scheme for Elamkulam West, which was envisaged a residential area. Certain plots in the residential colony had been converted into commercial plots for building offices, godowns, warehouses and showrooms, they contended.
The activities of these business establishments had made the life difficult for the residents. It had caused noise and air pollution in the area, besides posing a threat to the privacy and peaceful life of the residents. The traffic congestion on the colony’s service roads had become the order of the day due to illegal parking of vehicles, they complained.
