Gujrat high court refuses to stay Hazare bungalow demolition

VADODARA/AHMEDABAD: Gujarat high court declined to stay on Tuesday the demolition of a bungalow once occupied by legendary cricketer Vijay Hazare. It also pulled up the Vadodara-based Heritage Trust, which filed the PIL requesting a stay.

Trust members said that during the hearing, the HC asked them to submit more documents on the history of the 121-year-old "Pushpakoot Bungalow" and scheduled the next hearing on October 4.

The bench of Chief Justice Sunita Agarwal and Justice Aniruddha Mayee pulled up the trust for rushing to the HC merely on the basis of a news report and without doing any research on the history of the building. The trust has demanded that the bungalow be declared a heritage property.

Criticising the NGO for lacking basic information about listed monuments, the Chief Justice said: "If you are really working in this field and sincere about it, you would have done a lot. Nothing has been done by you... You are not even aware of the procedures and provisions about how a property is declared a heritage property."

Meanwhile, Hazare's son Ranjit has written to PM Narendra Modi seeking his intervention to retain the house and convert it into a cricket museum in the memory of his father.