Snehal Upadhyay –
Published on August 26, 2021, at 13:30 IST
The Bombay High Court’s Nagpur Bench quashed the petition of PoP (Plaster of Paris) idol makers seeking to lift the ban on sales.
The Court ordered its registry to file a suo motu PIL (Public Interest Litigation) on the adverse effects of immersing those idols on water bodies.
The Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) pointed out that the High Court has put a ban on the use of PoP in making idols from the year 2012 but the authorities have failed in implementing this.
A Division Bench of justices Sunil Shukre and Anil Kilor on Wednesday, however, permitted the makers to sell their products “only as PoP objects and not as idols”.
The petitioners were directed not to sell PoP idols during any festivals from now onwards.
The petitioners approached the Court in sought of relief.
Shreerang Bhandarkar was representing the petitioners, he contended that the petitioners have already made 4.5 lakhs PoP on the occasion of Ganesh Puja, Durga Puja and many other festivals and hence the implementation of this ban would adversely affect and they would incur a huge financial loss.
The Bench rejected the contentions and stated, “The petition raises important questions of public interest regarding the use of POP for different purposes and necessity for CPCB to regulate their use for preparing different objects not necessarily in the nature of idols.”
The Bench referred to the CPCB guidelines which stated, “The rationale behind such prohibition is quite understandable. The POP idols are procured from the market generally for their limited use during festivals. Subsequently, those are immersed in water bodies, which is a major cause for pollution of water bodies, increase in toxicity of major food sources like fish and other aquatic beings and damage to the environment. This would underline the need for taking guidelines seriously and implementing them with greater vigour.”
While adjourning the hearing till 31 August, the Court directed its registry to submit a detailed draft of the PIL.
Also Read: What is Court Adjournment?