The Supreme Court controls the destiny of thousands of properties near the centrally located monuments in India.
The law banning on construction within 100mts of the monuments has created confusion in the courts. The Apex Courts have called upon to interpret the British laws of 1904 and 1915 on the conservation and protection of the heritage monuments.
The main issue is where the calculation of the 100mts should be started, from the monuments itself or the boundary wall guarding the monument. This issue is to be settled by a bench of justices N V Ramana and Ajay Rastogi, on Friday.
The 100mts were calculated from the monument itself, was the practice maintained by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) even though it was not specified. There are always exceptions in the world; in this case it is the Humayun’s Tomb and Jantar Mantar. The ban was calculated from boundary walls in these two cases.
The bench made it clear that the previous ban by the Supreme Court to preserve historical monuments does not get thinned down due to the present confusion. The bench stated “Having regard to the facts and circumstances of these cases, we appoint Shyam Diwan, learned senior counsel, as amicus curiae to assist us in these matters”.
The Apex Court in its 2012 ruling prohibited any construction activities within 100 mts of heritage sites, last year the Centre changed the law and allowed development and infrastructure activities within 100 mts.
Delhi High Court judgement found nothing wrong with the ASI’s policy of making the 100mts rule flexible according to the case to case basis. An appeal was filed in the Supreme Court by a Delhi resident against the Delhi high Court ruling.
ASI had issued a no objection certificate for construction activities near Abdul Rahim Khan-i-Khanan’s Tomb, a protected monument located about 100 mts south of the Humayun’s Tomb complex (a world heritage site). The plea questions the decision of the ASI on the no objection certificate.
The Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958 was ignored and the High Court was blamed for the same. They also landed an argument stating that the 100 mts should be measured from the protected monument and not any other internal wall of the structure.
The plea added “If that be so, the legislation while enacting statutes for preservation of ancient monuments would not have included adjoining sites required for fencing and covering in the definition of Ancient Monument starting from the 1904 Act, 1958 Act and 2010 Act”.
A petition was filed by a Delhi resident challenging the Constitutional validity of the law that bans on the Construction activities 100 mts from all the protected monuments and archaeological sites across India, last year. Section 20-A of the AMASR Act, 1958, is arbitrary and imposes a prohibition on the construction activity, was a claim made by a senior citizen.
Courtesy/By: Shravani Sharma
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16 Jul 2019
