Noise levels in Mumbai will spike during Tuesday’s Ganpati Visarjan festivities, with the Supreme Court overruling a Bombay High Court order that banned the use of loudspeakers in Maharashtra.

The Bombay High Court on September 1 granted an interim stay to a recent amendment to the Noise Pollution (Regulation and Control) Rules. The amendment eliminated 1,573 notified “silence zones” in Mumbai ahead of the festive season. It gave state governments complete authority to declare a space a silence zone.

On Monday, however, a bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud stayed the September 1 High Court order. Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who appeared for state government, said the High Court erred when it stayed the rules. “If these all-India rules are implemented in a literal sense, you cannot use loudspeakers near a small clinic, school or even court premises which will virtually make the entire country go silent,” Mehta said.

But senior advocate CU Singh, appearing for anti-noise activists, said the High Court was justified in staying the rules and that the Supreme Court too had stayed them in the past.

On August 10, the Centre had issued a notification amending the noise rules, making state governments responsible for specifically notifying silence zones in their jurisdiction.

While the previous rules considered areas “not less than 100 metres around hospitals, educational institutions and courts” to be silence zones, the amended rules emphasise that no area can be declared a silence zone unless specifically notified by a state government.

The Maharashtra government decided against immediately notifying existing silence zones afresh, in effect doing away with noise restrictions near schools, hospitals, courts and religious shrines.

Activists challenged the amendment in the High Court, alleging it violated constitutional rights and was an “appeasement move” ahead of Ganpati and Dahi Handi celebrations, which is when loudspeakers are used liberally.