New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday declined to interfere with an order of the Bombay High Court directing the Maharashtra Cricket Association and the BCCI to shift all IPL matches which are to be held in the state from May 1 onwards citing drought.
A bench of chief justice T.S. Thakur and justices R. Banumathi and Uday Lalit told senior counsel Abhishek Singhvi and P. Chidambaram appearing for MCA and Pune cricket association respectively that the issue is whether you can waste water for the matches when the people are suffering.
When the CJI asked counsel as to how much of water will be required for the matches, Mr. Singhvi said that for matches to be played in Mumbai, about eight to 10 lakh litres will be required.
This was strongly disputed by counsel for the respondent, who was the petitioner in the High Court that 60 lakh litres are required for the matches. Mr Chidambaram said for the six matches in Pune, only 4.80 lakh litres are required and only sewerage treated water will be used for the pitches and non potable water for toilets in the stadium.
Mr Chidambaram said in an affidavit before the high court it has clearly undertaken to use only the sewage treated water made available to it by the Royal Western India Turf Club, from its sewage treatment plant at Mahalaxmi, Mumbai, which otherwise, in any case, would have been released into the sea.
The petitioner has also undertaken to supply at its own cost, a specified quantity of water to any government nominated village, as its own contribution to water deprived people of the specified region.
