Sealing: Traders’ body says SC panel dictatorial

New Delhi: Distressed over sealing of their shops, a traders’ body on Friday wrote to Union urban development minister Hardeep Singh Puri alleging that the Supreme Court-appointed monitoring committee is “dictatorial” and “anarchic” in their working.

The BJP-ruled civic bodies have undertaken sealing drive initiated by the Supreme Court-appointed monitoring committee. Commercial premises have been sealed for failing to deposit conversion charges according to provisions in the master plan.

The Confederation of All India Traders’ (CAIT) in the letter also asserted that the monitoring panel has become an institution in itself and that it was “commanding orders on constitutional agencies such as Municipal Corporation of Delhi Delhi Development, Authority, Delhi police, NDMC under the guise of powers of the Supreme Court".

“We wish to bring to your kind notice (to) the dictatorial and discretionary attitude of the monitoring committee in matter of sealing of shops and taking other penal actions in Delhi against traders, and people in general,” the letter read.

The CAIT also claimed that the sealing drive conducted recently at Chattarpur, Amar Colony and Rajouri Garden was done at the behest of the monitoring committee without furnishing any prior notice.

“The sealing team did not even made an attempt to verify whether the property to be sealed is legal or illegal. Simply on the orders of the monitoring committee the shops were sealed. Same thing happened in other areas of Delhi also,” the letter to the minister stated.

The BJP-ruled municipal corporations has undertaken sealing drive initiated by the SC-appointed monitoring committee.