Civic bodies such as the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) need not show hostility towards residents’ welfare associations by locking and sealing public buildings if vacant spaces in those buildings had been used by the residents for celebrating birthdays or for teaching yoga/music/dance to the children in the locality without any commercial motive, the Madras High Court has advised.
Justice R.N. Manjula said not all families would have the wherewithal to take private halls on rent for celebrating birthdays and other similar occasions. When their locality does not have a community hall, the residents would generally tend to look for some public space which could be used for such purposes. That, by itself, could not become a reason to lock and seal the public buildings, she said.
The observations were made while allowing a writ petition filed by Anna Nagar Western Extension Association represented by its secretary P. Vadivel. The judge accepted the arguments of the petitioner’s counsel Naveen Kumar Murthi and quashed an order passed by a Zonal Officer of GCC on February 21, 2024 asking the association to remove its belongings from a public library in the locality.
