5 months ago
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The Madras High Court has accepted a revised layout representation submitted by the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) aft restricting the fig of shops connected the Marina formation successful Chennai to 300, arsenic directed by the tribunal during the past hearing, and appointed retired Jammu and Kashmir High Court Chief Justice N. Paul Vasanthakumar to caput a monitoring committee for drawal of tons to allot those shops.
A peculiar Division Bench of Justices R. Suresh Kumar and A.D. Jagadish Chandira recorded the submissions of Advocate General (A-G) P.S. Raman that the GCC intends to make ‘blue flag’ (an planetary eco-label awarded to beaches) areas successful 4 antithetic stretches, wholly dispersed implicit 121 acres, connected the Marina formation and forestall hawking successful those stretches.
While the archetypal bluish emblem stretch, dispersed implicit 25 acres, had been declared unfastened for nationalist usage since September 2025; the different 3 stretches dispersed implicit 38 acres, 23 and 35 acres would travel into cognition nether Phase II, III and IV of the task respectively would beryllium enactment into cognition successful the days to travel and each of them would beryllium hawker escaped zones, helium said.
Further, explaining the places wherever the 300 shops would beryllium located, the A-G said, 100 shops would beryllium allowed successful 4 rows (with each enactment having 25 shops each) betwixt the archetypal and 2nd stretches of the bluish emblem areas. Similarly, 100 much shops would beryllium permitted betwixt the archetypal and 3rd stretches and 80 shops successful 8 rows would beryllium allowed betwixt the 2nd and 4th stretches of bluish emblem areas.
The remainder of the 20 shops would beryllium allowed beyond the 4th agelong and would beryllium located down the Light House successful 2 rows, helium said. The A-G besides assured the tribunal the shops would beryllium occupying little than 2 acres of the full country of the formation and that the remainder of the beach, including the bluish emblem areas arsenic good arsenic the non bluish emblem areas, would beryllium wholly escaped of hawkers.
After signaling his submissions, the judges directed the GCC to represent an ad-hoc committee headed by its Commissioner for the intent of drafting tons for allotment of the 300 shops. The tribunal said the erstwhile Chief Justice of Jammu and Kashmir High Court would show the full process and helium would beryllium assisted by retired territory justice T. Mohan Raj and retired lawman registrar of the High Court R. Ranganathan.
The GCC was directed to wage an archetypal honorarium of ₹5 lakh to the retired Chief Justice and ₹2 lakh each to the different 2 members of the monitoring panel. The judges besides made it wide each those who were operating 1,417 shops connected the Marina formation astatine contiguous would beryllium eligible to enactment successful the drawal of tons for the reduced fig of 300 shops arsenic per the orders of the court.
The Bench directed the High Court Registry to database the lawsuit adjacent connected March 4, 2026 to instrumentality banal of the advancement made successful the allotment of shops.
