Orissa HC refuses to intervene in state authorities’s determination on Durga idols, dismisses leisure plea

By Express News Service

CUTTACK: The Orissa High Court on Friday, September 17, 2021, dismissed the petition filed by Balu Bazar Puja Committee of Cuttack looking for leisure of the four-ft peak restriction for its Durga idol this yr. The Court mentioned that whereas Cuttack itself has over 150 Durga Puja samitis, the quantity would run into hundreds throughout Odisha.

“Relaxing the restriction for just one Durga Puja committee would trigger similar demands  all over, making it difficult for the government to strictly enforce the measures it has put in place at a time when the State is still in the grip of the Covid-19 pandemic”, the division bench of Chief Justice S Muralidhar and Justice B P Routray noticed.

The bench mentioned that the puja committee has not been in a position to persuade the Court that if the peak of the idol is restricted to 4 ft, then the sanctity of the event, the devotion and fervour related to the pageant, and the spiritual sentiments of the folks can be interfered with in a fashion opposite to custom.

“These may be matters of perception, but will have to be balanced against several countervailing interests and factors, which concern the health and safety of the public at large. These certainly are not easy decisions for the State to take. Equally, they are not to be interfered with lightly by the courts unless strong legal grounds exist”, the Bench additionally noticed.

It additional added that barring the petitioners, it seems that not one of the different Durga Puja samitis has discovered the restrictions on the peak of the idol to be hurtful of public sentiment or interfering with their celebration of the occasions. The bench mentioned the Durga Puja pageant is a mix of a number of parts of celebration and the idol is a vital element.

In respect of those many parts, there needs to be some quantity of restriction on the size and measurement. It is on this context that the restriction on the peak of the idol needs to be seen. It can’t be singled out as an ‘essential’ facet of a convention or follow with out which, the pageant itself could not have significance, it additional noticed.