Srinagar, Dec 30: The High Court of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh closed public interest litigation (PIL) regarding construction of Qazigund-Srinagar National Highway and widening of Pantha Chowk Road while observing that the construction work of the project has been completed and the same has been handed over to the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI).
A division bench of Justices, Sanjeev Kumar and M.A Chowdhary observed that the purpose, for which, the present PIL was filed, has been accomplished and, therefore, there remains nothing in this PIL to proceed further.
“The proceedings in this PIL are , thus, closed leaving it open to the petitioner to make a specific grievance, if any, they have in respect of construction of any particular road in accordance with law,” the bench said.
The court disposes of a PIL after taking note of a status report filed by the authorities stating that the construction work in question has been completed and the same has been handed over to the NHAI.
“From the reading of the status report and also having regard to the directions issued by this Court from time to time, we are satisfied that the purpose, for which, the present PIL was filed, has been accomplished and, therefore, there remains nothing in this PIL to proceed further,” the bench said.
Earlier, a PIL was filed by Civil Society Tral in 2015 about the dilapidated conditions of various roads in the valley which include National Highway from Awantipora to Tral as also the road from Pantha Chowk to Sonawar, Srinagar.
The Civil Society had sought directions for repairing the National Highway from Jammu to Srinagar especially from Banihal to Srinagar and Srinagar to Baramulla.
However, the court subsequently widened the scope of the PIL to encompass roads across the Valley.
It had also sought directions to macadamize the existing old NH1A to make it fit for vehicular traffic to the minimum international and national standards level to the convenience of the general public at large.
In addition to it, the petitioners had prayed directions to the government to constitute a team of experts to have physical spot inspection and conduct survey of NH1A and other link roads of Kashmir valley to assess the gravity of dilapidated condition of the roads and submit a detailed report with complete remedial suggestions in a time bound period.
