PIL in Delhi HC for water, sanitation facilities to traffic cops during duty hours

New Delhi: The Delhi High Court has sought responses from the Centre and the AAP government on a PIL seeking that drinking water, sanitation, and healthcare facilities be made available to traffic police officers on their sites in view of "extreme weather" and pollution.

Apart from the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government, a bench of Chief Justice Rajendra Menon and Justice V K Rao also issued a notice to Delhi Traffic Police and the Central Pollution Control Board, seeking their stand on the issue.

The central government's standing counsel Ravi Prakash and advocate Farman Ali, appearing for MHA accepted the notice and said that a response would be filed before the next date of hearing on January 23, 2019.

The court was hearing a PIL filed by an NGO, Legal Forum for Women, claiming that the traffic police officers are not mandated to undergo regular health check-ups in view of their working conditions.

It also said that they are not provided with benefits like insurance and ex-gratia for working in such a polluted environment under extreme weather conditions. The NGO has alleged that queries under the Right to Information law have revealed that neither the MHA nor the Delhi government has any such scheme to provide health benefits, water or sanitation to Delhi Police officers.

It claimed further that there were no records pertaining to health and medical fitness standards of Delhi Police and Delhi Traffic Police.

The petition has sought a direction to the Centre and the Delhi government to prepare draft rules and regulations on maintaining proper records with regard to providing basic facilities like drinking water, sanitation and regular medical check-ups to Delhi Traffic Police officers.