Supreme Court slams West Bengal for stalling metro rail project citing election and festival

The Supreme Court of India on Monday came down heavily on the West Bengal (WB) government for stalling the construction of Kolkata's Orange Line Metro Project. .A Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi slammed the State for challenging a Calcutta High Court order which had ordered traffic blockades on two consecutive weekend nights to enable construction of a 366 metre stretch at Chingrighata. The Bench opined that the State's argument that blockades cannot be implemented due to the festival season and upcoming assembly elections revealed the government's "obstinate attitude"."This merely exhibits the obstinate attitude of the authority wherein they want to delay and stall the metro rail project in city of Kolkata. There was no infirmity in order passed by the High Court, we are sure that the project is completed in a time-bound manner", the Bench recorded in its order dismissing the State's appeal. .Justice Joymalya Bagchi orally remarked that the State seemed to be prioritising festivals over development activities. "For you festival is more important than development! It is not that you are willing, you are duty bound. You told the High Court that you have festivals to take care of. Festival is more important than construction of a transport artery. We do not expect democratically elected government to knock on our door and ask for this to be ignored," Justice Bagchi said. Justice Bagchi also made it clear that the Court would not let the State government use the upcoming elections as an excuse to stall construction either. "If the Election Commission of India does not have a difficulty in setting up... This was a project before the Model code of conduct came into effect. We will not allow the State to allow to use this as a bogey to stall development again," he remarked.CJI Kant added that the High Court had been lenient in its approach to the matter as this was a case where action could have been ordered against the State's Chief Secretary or the Director General of Police. "We are only pointing out that HC has been very magnanimous. This was a fit case where your chief secretary, DGP should have been subjected to some action," CJI Kant orally remarked. While the State sought to withdraw the appeal, the Court rejected the same with the CJI saying,"This shows complete dereliction of your constitutional duty. This is just an attempt to politicise an issue where there is no such issue.".[Read Live Coverage]