The Uttar Pradesh government on Tuesday filed a draft vision document in the Supreme Court for the protection and preservation of Taj Mahal. In its vision document, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in UP proposed that the whole area in the vicinity of the iconic monument should be made plastic-free.
The document also calls for ban on factories and establishments that spread pollution in the area, and a riverfront alongside river Yamuna will also be developed for pedestrians. It points that the same would reduce vehicular pollution in the area.
A Supreme Court bench comprising Justice Madan B Lokur and Justice Deepak Gupta scheduled the next date of hearing in the case on July 31.
The draft vision document was submitted by the state government after the Supreme Court pulled it up over lack of maintenance of Taj Mahal. The Bench had also pulled up the central government in this regard.
In a strong statement, the Supreme Court had said that Taj Mahal should either be preserved or demolished. The top court had also questioned the government over no vision document for the preservation of the iconic monument.
Central government was questioned by the apex court over why it let commercial establishments and industries come up in the vicinity of Taj Mahal. Responding to it, the government had said that it would not allow any industry to come up in future.
The court had asked the government to take lessons from how the government in France took care of Eiffel Tower and preserved it despite lakhs of tourists visited the monument. The government had pointed that IIT-Kanpur and Environment Ministry were studying the causes of pollution affecting Taj Mahal and that necessary actions would be taken at the earliest.
