How many more deaths due to strays? HC slams cops, NMC over Kalamna child death
Tired of too many ads? go ad free now
A visibly anguished division bench of Justices Anil Kilor and Manohar Nerlikar verbally asked pointedly, "How many times must we repeat ourselves?" while hearing a public interest litigation filed by activist Vijay Talewar. The PIL, filed in 2022, sought sustained action against the growing threat of stray dog attacks across Nagpur.
Senior counsel Firdos Mirza, appearing for the petitioner, brought to the court's notice the recent fatal incident, in which the minor fell to his death, reported in the media.
Mirza submitted that this was not an isolated case and warned that if authorities continued to ignore their legal duty, more lives would be lost. "Under the Mumbai Police Act, the police are duty-bound to prevent such public nuisances. But no concrete preventive mechanism seems to exist," he said.
The court observed that its earlier directives dated October 20 and November 23, 2022, clearly laid out preventive actions, yet there was no evidence of implementation.
The judges directed both the commissioner of police and the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) to file detailed affidavits on their compliance with previous court orders and list all actions taken to control the stray menace.
Additional govt pleader Deepak Thakare represented the state while Ashwin Deshpande pleaded on behalf of intervenor Dhantoli Nagrik Mandal, and deputy solicitor general of India Nandesh Deshpande appeared for the central govt.
Tired of too many ads? go ad free now
The NMC was also asked to specifically report on the availability of anti-rabies vaccines. While Mirza pointed out an ongoing shortage in the city, counsel for the NMC, Sudhir Puranik, countered that vaccines were available. The court directed that this discrepancy be clarified through an affidavit.
"It is expected that both the commissioner of police and the municipal commissioner shall file affidavits on or before July 23," the court stated, scheduling the next hearing for July 25.
The PIL names 15 respondents, including the state govt, police, civic authorities, and animal welfare boards.
The court's strong observations come amid growing public outrage over the city's stray dog problem. With several attacks reported in recent months and limited visible action on sterilisation or containment, the judiciary has now made it clear that further lapses will not be tolerated.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Time of India
10 hours ago
- Time of India
HC takes suo motu cognizance of 10,000 open manholes across city
Nagpur: The Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court on Wednesday took suo motu cognizance of a disturbing media report highlighting over 10,000 open or broken manholes across the city, directing the filing of a public interest litigation within two weeks. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now The bench, comprising Justices Anil Kilor and Vrushali Joshi, expressed concern over the civic body's failure to act despite the serious threat to public safety, particularly during the monsoon. "Such widespread neglect by the municipal authorities cannot be ignored. It directly endangers human lives," the court observed, appointing Shilpa Giratkar as amicus curiae to draft and submit the PIL. The trigger was a July 30 report that detailed how thousands of sewer and drainage chamber lids across roads and footpaths are either missing or damaged. Many are submerged under stagnant rainwater, making them invisible and turning regular commutes into high-risk journeys for pedestrians, motorists, and animals. The issue cropped up during the hearing of a petition by a woman, Asha Bhagat, filed through Giratkar, whose son died after falling into an uncovered well between Automotive Square and Kamptee Road. The bench directed to club this case along with the suo motu PIL on manhole safety. As per the report, despite sanctioning Rs15 crore — Rs1.5 crore per zone across 10 city zones — for installing 10,000 new covers, the Nagpur Municipal Corporation has not initiated a single repair. The tender process was completed in April, but no actual work followed. Most of the older cast-iron lids were reportedly stolen for scrap. Even temporary cement covers were stripped of embedded metal rods. While the NMC proposed switching to SFRC (Steel Fibre Reinforced Concrete) covers, the plan never left the paper stage. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now "Tenders were floated and police complaints were filed, yet the chambers remain open," the report noted. The absence of covers has also led to a spike in accident cases, with both people and animals falling into open manholes. The condition is especially dangerous on flooded roads and submerged footpaths. Several internal city roads routinely turn into mini-lakes during the monsoon, worsening the hazard, the report mentioned.
Indian Express
a day ago
- Indian Express
NMC has asked disabled students to declare ‘what they cannot do'. This is illegal — and cruel
It was a typical exhausting Friday at my medical college. I returned home, drained from the day, expecting nothing more than dinner and rest. Instead, what awaited me was an email from the Supreme Court of India. I was being directed — on short notice — to assess a NEET-UG aspirant with a disability the very next morning and submit my report in a sealed envelope by Monday. The court had rejected two previous assessments by AIIMS Nagpur and AIIMS Delhi. Why? Because both had done what most institutions do best — calculate percentages of disability instead of assessing a student's ability to pursue medicine. The student was Om Rathod — 88 per cent disabled due to muscular dystrophy — and yet, burning with determination to become a doctor. What the court wanted was not a number, but an answer: Can he, with the right support, study medicine? That assessment led to a landmark Supreme Court judgment — a rare beacon of inclusive justice — directing the National Medical Commission (NMC) to revise its outdated and discriminatory guidelines for MBBS admissions. But what came next — just last week — is a betrayal not just of that spirit, but of the law. The NMC's 'interim guidelines' came two days before the counselling deadline. Buried within them was a new clause: A self-declaration affidavit. It asks candidates with disabilities to legally affirm — on stamp paper — what they cannot do. Can they stand on one leg? Can they climb stairs unaided? The real question is: Why isn't the NMC reading the Constitution? I asked Om, the same young man whose courage moved the apex court to act, whether he could truthfully answer those questions. 'No,' he said. And he shouldn't have to. These questions are humiliating, ableist, and illegal. They punish you for not performing like a non-disabled body — even though the very idea of 'reasonable accommodation' is to remove barriers so people can perform. I assessed Om's functional competency. He uses a mobility scooter. I use callipers and crutches myself. Neither of us can bear weight on our affected limbs. Neither of us can climb stairs without help. But both of us made it through medicine. So what, exactly, is NMC trying to assess? The committee behind these guidelines clearly has no understanding of functional ability or of what the Supreme Court ordered. In its first meeting in February — on record in the Anmol v UOI case — the NMC agreed it was time to rename 'Disability Assessment Boards' to 'Ability Assessment Boards,' and to define what reasonable accommodations actually mean. None of that made it into the final document. Instead, the NMC waited till the Court went on summer recess and dropped this vague, ableist document without public consultation — just days before the counselling deadline. This delay has created chaos once again. A family from Odisha has been stuck in Delhi for over a week waiting for their son's assessment. In the South, students from Telangana and Andhra are being forced to travel across states to Kerala or Tamil Nadu. The Court had explicitly ordered one assessment centre per state. Clearly, the NMC wasn't listening. It also wasn't listening when the court mandated that these assessment boards must include doctors with disabilities, to train them and guard against ableist bias. That, too, never happened. So what we get are absurd rejections like the one from Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital in Tamil Nadu: 'Since the patient is wheelchair-bound, she cannot do coordinated activities of the lower limb. Not eligible.' Wheelchair-bound? Patient? This is not only inaccurate, it's insulting. The same state has a gastro-surgeon with polio performing liver transplants and a urologist doing surgeries using a standing wheelchair. The organisation Doctors with Disabilities: Agents of Change has multiple wheelchair-user (not patients) doctors thriving and flourishing. Perhaps the doctors rejecting these students should consult their own colleagues before making such statements — or, at the very least, read the Omkar Gond v UOI (2024) judgment. What makes this even more damning is that there's still no appellate body in place, even though the Court mandated one. That means these students — already exhausted, humiliated, and denied — have no path to appeal unless they somehow make it to the high court or the Supreme Court again. But how many can afford that? How many have the strength? It's clear now that neither the NMC nor DGHS has learned anything from the multiple rap-on-the-knuckle SC orders. They continue to deny disabled aspirants, recycling the same experts who wrote the guidelines the Court already struck down. The result? A process that is not just broken — it is cruel. This isn't just a policy failure. It is a systemic refusal to listen, to learn, to evolve. The experts with lived experience are the ones who navigate this reality every day. Until our institutions learn to value lived experience over outdated assumptions, the cycle of discrimination will continue — wrapped neatly in a sealed envelope, marked urgent, and delivered into the void where justice should have been. The writer is a medical doctor at University College of Medical sciences, Delhi, and SC SC-appointed expert in Om Rathod v DGHS and Anmol v UOI SC judgements. Views are personal
Time of India
a day ago
- Time of India
Tipeshwar Tribals Move HC Over Lost Farmlands, Claim Compensation Unjust
Nagpur: Tribal families displaced by the Tipeshwar Wildlife Sanctuary project in Yavatmal have approached the Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court, alleging denial of fair compensation for their ancestral farmland, despite government assurances at the time of resettlement. In a petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution, the affected farmers claimed they were uniformly given ₹10 lakh compensation in 2012, without differentiating between those who owned farmland and those who didn't. "While others lost homes, we lost our only source of livelihood—our ancestral farmland. No one explained this at the time of acquisition," the petition states. A division bench comprising Justices Anil Kilor and Vrushali Joshi has issued notices to the state revenue and forest departments, the principal chief conservator of forests (PCCF), and district officials, seeking a response. The petitioners, supported by the Tipeshwar Shetkari Sangharsh Samiti, have sought either separate compensation for farmland, alternative agricultural land, or employment for one family member. They referred to a 2015 government resolution (GR) offering enhanced compensation to those displaced by wildlife projects—a policy upheld in 2022 by the same court for 330 families from Maregaon village, also displaced by the Tipeshwar project. "We were displaced under the same policy, yet Maregaon families received revised compensation while we were ignored. This is arbitrary and discriminatory," the petition states. The plea further accuses authorities of misleading the families during resettlement and failing to respond to repeated representations. It also invokes the state's constitutional duty to protect the socio-economic rights of tribal communities, especially when their sole livelihood—agricultural land—is forcibly taken.
