[size=10pt]Even God cannot save India, rues SC[/size]
New Delhi, DHNS & Agencies:

"Even god will not be able to save this country," a fuming Supreme Court on Tuesday said while slamming the government for its refusal to amend the law for launching criminal prosecution against those who illegally occupy official houses...


“We are fed up with this government,” the apex court said, adding: “They don’t have the guts to differ with the opinion of the clerks. Even god will not be able to save this country. In India even if god comes down he cannot change our country. Our country’s character has gone. We are helpless,” a bench of Justices B N Aggrawal and G S Singhvi observed while hearing the case, S D Bandi vs Divisional Traffic Officer, KSRTC.

The court declined to hear the case, saying: “If this is the attitude of the government we will not hear the petition.’’ It decided to hear only individual matters concerning eviction and said that the bunch of petitions would not be heard by it.

The apex court said PILs are being filed before it by people who are vexed with the approach of the government on various issues. “You complain about judicial activism when you are in power. When you are not in power you come to us for remedy,” the bench remarked.

The bench gave vent to its anger as Additional Solicitor General Amarender Saran bluntly told the court that the Union government has decided not to amend Section 441 IPC (criminal trespass) for prosecuting squatters of government accommodation in the country. The government took the stance that existing provisions provided under the Public Premises Act was sufficient to evict those unauthorisedly occupying government accommodation.

Moreover, it claimed that out of 99,100 government houses only 300-odd dwellings were under unauthorised occupation.

But this did not satisfy the apex court which said the government does not have the guts to take on the offenders.

While saying that “they” did not have the guts to differ with the opinion of the clerks, the apex court’s apparent reference was to the reluctance of the officials to amend the Act as directed by the apex court during the earlier hearings.

Under the Public Premises Act, the government can at best collect only compounding fees besides initiating civil proceedings in an appropriate court for their eviction.

Stating that the existing Act had proved ineffective, the court asked the Centre and the states to amend Section 441 of the IPC to make the offence non-bailable and ensure that the offenders were jailed.

However, despite the directions neither the Centre nor most of the states evinced any interest in the apex court’s directive.

Sure, what you say is true...there is an incident which took place when J.L. Nehru was PM. A file marked by virtually everyone up the chain of command reached the PM. Jawahar Nehru simply drew an arrow to where the section officer who had initiated the file and wrote, "I agree". The file was again sent downwards through proper channel. The Secretary, JS, DS, Section officer and Headclerk were quite perplexed that the PM had not even acknowledged their remarks and instead seemed to be conversing directly with their junior. This issue was raised in a meeting. JL N was unfazed. Why not? he countered ...he is the one applied his mind and struck his neck out by initiating the comment and all you guys added to it were comments like "DS may please see", "for your perusal and comments", "we may have no objections to this, if the PM agrees" etc. There was no original contribution in your remarks so why should I respond" JLN said making a face.. No one present in the hall had the face to tell the PM that he was wrong. !! It's a fact ... Even today bureaucratic comments are the same.

absolutely right......