Mumbai civic body can file FIRs against those feeding pigeons despite ban, says HC
If they ‘don’t want to follow the rule of law, then the law should catch up with them’, said the bench.
The Bombay High Court on Wednesday said that the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation can register first information reports against those who continue to feed pigeons despite directives against it.
A bench of Justices G S Kulkarni and Arif Doctor, in response to petitions by animal welfare activists, said that the subject at hand was that of a public health hazard affecting children and the elderly.
The High Court allowed the municipal corporation to file cases against those feeding pigeons under sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita pertaining to public nuisance, negligent acts likely to spread infectious diseases and malignant acts likely to spread life-threatening diseases.
The court took note of news reports and photographs of the Dadar kabootarkhana, or pigeon feeding spot, and said that they were quite “telling” that the matter needed immediate action. The counsel for the municipal corporation also said that in some cases, pigeon feeders were refusing to pay fines when caught by civic officials.
The court said this showed that merely filing non-cognisable reports against violators was not sufficient.
“This is now compounded with an emerging situation of utter disregard for law, by those who defiantly continue to feed pigeons in the teeth of our earlier order rejecting pleas supporting any such feeding and congregation of pigeons and now obstruction to civic officials from discharging their duties in this regard,” the bench said.
In addition to allowing the municipal corporation to file FIRs against violators, the court told the civic body to install closed-circuit television cameras at places where pigeon feeding was still taking place.
The bench verbally said that if pigeon feeders “don’t want to follow the rule of law, then the law should catch up with them”, The Indian Express reported.
The case will be heard further on August 7.
On July 3, the Maharashtra government told the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation to begin the process of shutting down pigeon feeding points in the city. The High Court, however, told the civic body not to demolish heritage kabootarkhanas.
Also read: Why India needs to rethink its love for pigeons
