On Thursday, the administration mercilessly razed 300 houses in a combing operation of bulldozers in Nagina Colony in Lalkuan of Nainital district in Uttarakhand. There are about four thousand people residing in houses here and the railway has uprooted them.
It is one of the grosses violations of people’s rights, breaking constitutional norms. On the pretext of encroachment, heavy police force in the presence of railway and district administration embarked on an operation of bulldozing these houses.
The government destroyed more the houses without any alternative rehabilitation plan.
Inspite of an old instruction of the Supreme Court that no colony can be destroyed without rehabilitation in Lalkuan, Haldwani, Uttarakhand Nagina Colony, the government went ahead with the demolition.
The police lathi-charged the residents of the colony, in which some people, were badly injured. During this, more than two dozen people who were protesting were detained.
On Wednesday, the Nainital High Court heard the residence case of about four thousand people in Nagina Colony. A division bench of Chief Justice Vipin Sanghi and Justice Rakesh Thapliyal dismissed the petition of the residents and declared removal of the alleged illegal encroachment.
After the High Court of Nainital rejected the petition of the slum dwellers, the administration did not even abide them time to present their case in the Supreme Court.
Bulldozers started running on the houses at 10 am on Thursday.
People of Nagina Colony in Haridwar and representatives of various political parties including Progressive Mahila Ekta Kendra, Parivartan Kami Chhatra Sanghatana, Interacr Workers Organisation, Aam Aadmi Party protested..
Police arrested a dozen protesters after using force.
Leading the movement included Bindu Gupta and Pushpa, president of Progressive Women’s Unity Center, who was released late at night.
Local people have been inhabitants there for the last 40-50 years and now suddenly the Railways is calling it an encroachment.
Harsh Thakor is a freelance journalist who has covered mass movements around India. Thank s information from Inquilabi Mazdoor Kendra and Workers Unity
