Mail News Service
Jamshedpur, September 13: The High Court will hear the petition challenging Jamshedpur’s designation as an industrial town once the Supreme Court’s decision on the matter is finalized. On Friday, Acting Chief Justice Sujit Narayan Prasad and Justice AK Rai directed that the hearing be scheduled after the Supreme Court’s ruling.
During the hearing, Advocate General Rajiv Ranjan informed the court that, in the 2018 Jawaharlal Sharma vs. Jharkhand Government case, the Supreme Court had given the state government the discretion to designate areas as industrial towns. The issue remained pending before the Supreme Court.
The petition, filed by Saurabh Vishnu, contested the Jharkhand government’s notification dated December 23, 2023, which designated 15,460 acres of Jamshedpur, including the Tata Steel factory and its colony, as an industrial town. Vishnu had requested that the court to cancel this notification and direct the government to designate Jamshedpur’s urban areas as a municipal corporation under Article 243 of the Constitution.
The petitioner argued that this designation placed oversight responsibilities in the hands of Tata Steel, chaired by the Jamshedpur DC, thus bypassing public electoral processes for municipal positions like Municipal Commissioner and Mayor.
