Remove all unauthorised flag poles within a week, says High Court

Seeks compliance report by April 1

The Madras High Court on Monday ordered removal of all unauthorised flag poles from city roads, State highways as well as national highways.

The court directed the officials concerned to ensure that the flag posts were removed within a week and a compliance report was filed by April 1.

Justices S. Manikumar and Subramonium Prasad issued the direction on a public interest litigation petition filed by advocate A. Radhakrishnan during the 2016 Assembly elections. The case had been filed on the ground that indiscriminate erection of flag poles posed a threat to road users besides damaging underground optic fibre cables.

Though it was pending for long, a Division Bench of Justices M. Sathyanaryanan and P. Rajamanickam passed a detailed interim order on December 3, 2018 and stated that the laws applicable to corporations, municipalities, town panchayats and village panchayats require prior permission for erection of flag poles.

“A perusal and consideration of the above cited statutory provisions and rules would prima facie disclose that erection of flag poles by any political party or organisation without license or permission is prohibited. But the said provisions are complied with more in breach than in compliance,” the judges had said.

Lamenting the practice of local bodies turning a blind eye to the illegality, the judges said: “the result is that pedestrians as well as other road users are put to grave risk and peril.” In the event of any mishap taking place, the judges warned that the local bodies would have to compensate the victims instead of shifting the blame on the violators.

“Therefore, it is for the local body concerned to ensure that no flag poles are erected on road margins,” the judges had said and called for status reports from the government officials.

Accordingly, Additional Government Pleader E. Manoharan informed the court on Monday that nearly 1,500 out of around 5,000 flag poles in Chennai city have already been removed.

Advocate Richard Wilson, representing the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), insisted upon the cooperation of the police in removing unauthorised flag posts. He also brought it to the notice of the court that the first Division Bench of the High Court too had passed a similar order in the past.