‘Spell steps to appoint full-time Governor for Tamil Nadu’

Hearing a plea moved in this regard, a division bench comprising justice Huluvadi G Ramesh and Justice RMD Teekaa Raman on directing the ASG to obtain necessary instructions posted the  case for further hearing to April 18. 

V Anbazhagan, a social worker, had contended in his plea that after the tenure of K Rosaiyah came to an end on August 31, 2016, the Governor of Maharashtra K Vidyasagar Rao has been given additional charge as Governor of Tamil Nadu since September 2, 2016. But for the past eight months there has been no effective administration in Tamil N a d u since the in-charge Governor spends most of his days in the administration and executive work at Maharashtra. 

Also, on pointing out that after taking charge as Governor of Tamil Nadu, Vidyasagar Rao attended his official duty only for a few days in a month, he said the in-charge Governor had come to Tamil Nadu only to attend the last rituals of former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa and swearing of two Chief Ministers. He also pointed out that four Universities in State remain headless, the State Human Rights Commission is devoid of judicial and administrative members while the State Women’s Commission, Child Welfare commission, Minority Commission and Wakf Board does not have a chairperson respectively owing to the absence of a fulltime Governor. The plea sought the court to direct the Centre to appoint a full-time governor in Tamil Nadu by applying the recommendations laid down by the Sarkaria Commission.

The Madras High Court has been informed that a team headed by Health Secretary, comprising experts from fire safety department would be constituted within two weeks to inspect and monitor fire safety arrangements installed in hospitals.

The first bench comprising Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice M Sundar on recording the submission of the Advocate General in this regard on Friday, said, “The committee shall prepare a report in other aspects of safety and file it in the court within three months.” The PIL, moved by social activist Jawaharlal Shanmugam in 2015 had submitted that there were several multi-specialty hospitals, both government and private, functioning in high-rise buildings and most of them lacked ramp facility. In case of emergencies due to natural calamities or man-made disasters, it would be next to impossible to evacuate patients from such buildings, he said. Following several bouts of prodding and strictures being passed asking the state to formulate a final policy on fire safety measures for multistory hospitals, the Government in July 2016 had framed guidelines making it mandatory for all hospitals built after 2007 to construct ramps within a year. 

Insisting that ramps are mandated to ease the evacuation of patients during fire accidents, the notification directed the older hospitals to approach the fire and rescue services department to explore other options if faced with space crunch. 

However, CMDA in an affidavit filed before the court during January 2017 had stated that out of the 210 hospitals inspected only 56 had provided ramp facilities. The report claimed that nine teams, each comprising deputy planners and assistant planners, had inspected 150 hospital buildings in the Chennai Metropolitan Area (CMA) covering major hospitals. Of these, 124 hospitals were found without ramp facilities. Notices were issued on January 20, 2016, to provide ramps within 45 days. But an inspection carried out in 88 more hospitals in December 2016 found that none of them had the facility, the affidavit said. Now, the case has been listed for further hearing to April 28.