How did buildings come up on lake land, Hyderabad High court asks collector

Hyderabad: Finding fault with the Hyderabad district administration for not protecting Suram Cheruvu in Bandlaguda from encroachers, the Hyderabad High Court on Friday directed the collector to file an affidavit explaining why he had failed to stop constructions in the full tank level despite court orders.

A division bench comprising acting Chief Justice Ramesh Ranganathan and Justice M. Satyanarayana Murthy was dealing with a contempt case moved by the Primary Fishermen Cooperative Marketing Society Ltd.

The High Court in August 2015 had granted an interim order on a PIL filed by the society and had directed the authorities to ensure constructions would not come up within the FTL.

The society;s counsel told the court that despite its orders several influential persons were grabbing the lake land and continuing with the construction.

The bench told the collector to take the issue seriously in view of the allegations of the petitioner of involvement of influential persons and submit the affidavit explaining the action taken so far to protect the lake within a week.