Chennai: The Madras high court has ordered notice to state government on a petition which sought direction to authorities for proper maintenance of tanks and to remove encroachments from them in all 32 districts.
A division bench of Justices M Sathyanarayanan and G K Ilanthiraiyan, before which a PIL from activist A. Narayanan of Virugambakkam came up for hearing, has ordered notice to authorities concerned and adjourned the matter to August 16 for further hearing.
Narayanan, in the petition, submitted as per the orders of the high court, the State government had enacted Protection of Tanks and Eviction of Encroachment Act 2007 and Rules in 2007. Section 6 of the Act states that the survey officers, after completion of survey, have to prepare charts and registers for the tanks and the same shall be handed over to the PWD for maintenance.
He said as per section 7, encroachments shall be evicted from tanks. It suggested slapping penalties by way of three months imprisonment or fine of Rs 5,000.
However, despite passage of 10 years, the authorities had not taken any action and objectives of the Act not fulfilled. Hence, the present petition seeking direction to the state to proper maintenance of the tanks after removing encroachments as per the Act.
