Plea to reverse railways takeover of parking lot

COIMBATORE: Days after an interim injunction was vacated allowing railway authorities to take charge of the parking lot at the railway junction in Coimbatore, the petitioner who obtained the stay earlier has filed a fresh case before the first additional district munsif court. The petition filed by G K Dhanapalan, secretary of Coimbatore Railway Passengers Welfare Association in Coimbatore, has been posted for hearing on August 12."Parking space has been reduced by the railway authorities and without the addressing the issue that affects the passengers now they have invited tenders again," N Rathina Kumar, counsel for the petitioner told TOI.
Interestingly, the petitioner has submitted that until the issue is resolved the contractor who ran the parking lot and attracted flak for overcharging motorists should be allowed to maintain it. The tender for the parking lot at Coimbatore junction had expired on November 2012 and when the railways invited tenders soon after, Dhanapalan filed a case demanding interim injunction for the tender process and sought the maintenance of status quo, which was granted by the court in December 2012. Due to the stay order, railways were unable to issue a fresh parking contract until now. On July 23, a local court vacated the stay while reserving its order. The railways then moved in and took over the parking lot on August 1. Tenders to finalise a new contractor is scheduled to be opened on August 14.
A senior railway official said the railways will file their counters to the new petition soon. But he added that passenger associations represent one issue or another to the railways on a regular basis but the association in question has not been involved in a single correspondence so far.
Convenor of the Coimbatore Railway Struggle Committee and Divisional Railway Users Consultative Committee (DRUCC) member R Raveendran said neither he nor his colleagues have heard about any association by the name Coimbatore Railway Passengers Welfare Association. "The association is not involved with us and its activities are not known," he said. Coordinator of the struggle committee G K Nagaraj also said all passenger associations except this one were members of the struggle committee headed by Coimbatore MP P R Natarajan.
The petitioner's counsel N Rathina Kumar said Coimbatore Railway Passengers Welfare Association was floated by his petitioner to take up the parking issue at Coimbatore Railway Junction.