The Madras High Court on Friday ordered the demolition of four more bungalows constructed within 200 metres of the high tide line of Bay of Bengal along East Coast Road at Muttukadu near here in utter violation of Coastal Regulatory Zone (CRZ) regulations.
Justices M.M. Sundresh and Krishnan Ramasamy issued the direction after dismissing individual writ petitions filed by the bungalow owners challenging notices affixed by the government authorities on the properties declaring them to be illegal constructions.
The judges agreed with Special Government Pleader E. Manoharan that the area of 200 metres from the high tide line had been declared as no development zone through a 2011 CRZ notification and hence all the five buildings in question must be demolished.
The SGP also told the court that the local panchayat had no right to grant building plan permission for a construction in the no development zone. He also brought it to the notice of the court that notices were issued to the petitioners way back in 2012.
However, they moved the court through the present writ petitions in 2013 and got the process delayed. The issue gained momentum only after one Murugan filed a writ petition in 2018 to demolish all the buildings constructed close to the coast.
Authoring the verdict, Justice Ramasamy pointed out that another Division Bench of Justices M. e and R. Hemalatha had ordered demolition of a bungalow in the same locality in January this year and the owner ended up demolishing it by himself.
Since the present cases were of similar nature, the judges directed the Mamallapuram Local Planning Authority to demolish all four bungalows at the earliest with the assistance of the police and Tamil Nadu Coastal Zone Management Authority.
