Court to act against policemen for defacement of Delhi Metro pillars

New Delhi, Mar 29 (UNI) The Delhi High Court today said action would be initiated against the police officials if the posters and banners on the public places, including on the pillars of the Delhi Metro Rail, were not removed within four weeks.

While hearing a PIL, a division bench of Justice Vijender Jain and Justice S N Agrawal said the Station House Officers(SHOs) of the police stations would be booked for dereliction of duty if the public places were not kept clean.

The Judges observed, ''What are the policemen doing in the night when the private agencies paste posters and banners on the public walls and Metro Rail pillars?'' The Court asked the police to file an action taken report on the issue by May 10, the next date of hearing.

The SHOs of eight police stations were present in the court with affidavits.

The High Court had asked the Delhi Police Commissioner to issue direction to the police staff taking action against the persons who were defacing public property by sticking posters, bills and writing slogans.

Advocate Monica Arora had filed the PIL along with photographs of public property, including that of Delhi Metro stations, whose walls had been plastered with posters and bills.

In 2005, the Court had passed orders saying that defacement of public property is a cognisable offence and the police should register cases and take action on their own if they found violation of the law that protects public property from defacement.

However, Ms. Arora alleged people were defying the order with impunity and the city police were not taking action against them.

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