Now pay Rs 100 fine for urinating in public
NDMC says it is now planning to strictly enforce the law penalising those urinating in public by issuing spot challans going up to Rs 100 with help from the traffic police.
Desperate to urinate and no public toilets around? If you are in an NDMC area, do not dare to relieve yourself in public. Two days after Hindustan Times published its report ‘High on drive, low on cleanliness’, the NDMC says it is now planning to strictly enforce the law penalising those urinating in public by issuing spot challans going up to Rs 100 with help from the traffic police. One could even face prosecution.
Moreover, it has, for the first time, started putting up boards saying ‘Open urination is a punishable offence’ (sic). These boards came up after HT reported about the pathetic sanitary conditions in the Delhi High Court complex and the adjoining buildings manned by the NDMC. People have been urinating on the boundary wall of the National Gallery of Modern Art wall since quite some time now.
The NDMC later said that it has proposed constructing four public urinals in the area.
The fact that such poor sanitary conditions exist outside the very court which has been monitoring the city’s cleanliness since 12 years has embarrassed the NDMC.
Said lawyer Ashok Agarwal on whose PIL the court began monitoring the sanitation scene in the city, “As per the NDMC Act, urinating in public has always been an offence, but they have never shown a determination like this by putting up signages.”
PK Sharma, director of the NDMC’s Public Health, wing told HT, “We wanted to caution the public by putting up these boards. Urinating in public has always been an offence but the problem was issuing spot challans. Initially the tie up with traffic police was effective but then it wore down.”
But as the NDMC does not have the manpower to station its staff for monitoring the situation in its areas, Sharma said that the civic body is all set to begin fresh negotiations with the traffic police.
Four toilets near High Court area
Two days after the report on pathetic sanitary conditions around the Delhi High Court complex appeared in HT, the civic body has promised to construct four public urinals in the area.
PK Sharma, director of NDMC’s Public Health wing said: “Soon after the news report, our officials surveyed the area and have identified four spots to construct the urinals.”
The NDMC said that it always wanted to construct public urinals near the court but faced stiff resistance from the Archeological Survey of India (ASI) as it fell within 100 metres of the Sher Shah Suri Gate and Khair-e-Nul-Manzil, two protected monuments near the court. “We are still in talks with the ASI and hope to sort out the issue,” NDMC sources said.
There are no public urinals in the high court complex and thousands of people who visit the court daily have been forced to urinate in the open.