During the hearing, the court took note of a viral video of an eight-year-old girl who was seen clutching her books and running as a bulldozer razed shanties in UP’s Ambedkar Nagar.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday came down heavily on the Uttar Pradesh government and the Prayagraj Development Authority for 2021 demolition drive and termed it “illegal” and “insensitive”.
During the hearing, the court took note of a viral video of an eight-year-old girl who was seen clutching her books and running as a bulldozer razed shanties in UP’s Ambedkar Nagar.
“There is a viral video where a small girl can be seen outside a demolished house. Everyone is very disturbed by such visuals,” Justice Ujjal Bhuyan remarked during the hearing, as reported by Live Law.
The video, which surfaced last week on X, showed a girl child clutching books and running away from a shanty during a demolition. As per the news agency PTI, the video is from an anti-encroachment drive in Jalalpur, Ambedkar Nagar. The police has stated that the demolition was carried out to remove encroachments from village land based on an ejection order of the Jalalpur tehsildar court.
The bench of Justice AS Oka and Justice Bhuyan, who slammed the government and authorities for the demolition of the houses of a lawyer, a professor and three others in Prayagraj in 2021, expressed concern over the manner in which demolitions were being conducted in Uttar Pradesh.
The apex court also asked the authorities to pay a fixed compensation of Rs 10 lakh to each homeowner who approached the court in such cases within six weeks.
The bench further said that such cases shock the conscience, adding that the residential premises of the appellants have been high-handedly demolished.
“We will record this whole thing as illegal and we will say that as far as rights in the land are concerned, we are not offering any comment,” Justice Oka said, adding, “And fix compensation of 10 lakhs in each case. That is the only way to do this. So that this authority will always remember to follow due process.”