06 February,2023 09:07 PM IST | Mumbai | PTI
Representative Image. Pic/iStock
The Bombay High Court on Monday asked the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to ensure that the footpaths in the city are "actually walkable" for pedestrians and directed it to remove encroachments by unlicensed hawkers.
A division bench of Justices Gautam Patel and Neela Gokhale directed the BMC to file an affidavit by March 1 identifying specific problems and indicating the solutions it would offer to deal with the issue.
Also read: PNB scam: Employee of Nirav Modi's firm gets bail more than four years after filing plea
The high court had earlier this year taken up suo motu (on its own) the issue of unauthorised hawkers and stalls on footpaths in the city.
ALSO READ
TTE suspended for making pax write apology for asking him to speak in Marathi
Traffic restrictions issued in BKC ahead of MVA's poll campaign launch rally
How WR managed Diwali and Chhath festival passenger rush at Bandra Terminus
Neral-Matheran train services to resume from November 6, says Central Railway
IPS Sanjay Verma to be next Maharashtra DGP
The BMC's counsel S U Kamdar on Monday informed the court that several such hawkers were being removed by the corporation and specific hawking zones were being established to address the issue of encroachments.
The bench, while appreciating the steps being taken, noted that because of such hawkers, footpaths in the city have become narrow and most of them cannot be used by pedestrians.
"We need to ensure there are footpaths available for pedestrians, which are actually walkable. There are authorised or unauthorised structures on footpaths. The result is that because the footpath is narrow, pedestrians face difficulty," Justice Patel said.
The court further said that the BMC must implement rules to make footpaths disabled-friendly and to ensure that elderly people can walk on them without any hassles.
"One of the bigger problems is paver blocks. They keep on coming out and popping out and causing problems to pedestrians. We do not know what the technical difficulties are, but someone from the engineering department needs to look into this. Even senior citizens stumble despite walking with sticks. You should make the footpath accessible," the court said.
The bench posted the matter for further hearing on March 3.
This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed, agencies. Mid-day accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability, trustworthiness, reliability and data of the text. Mid-day management/mid-day.com reserves the sole right to alter, delete or remove (without notice) the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever.