Delhi HC junks plea seeking ban on deities' images on walls to prevent public urination

Delhi: The Delhi high court on Monday junked a plea seeking ban on affixing deities' images on walls to prevent people from urinating, spitting or littering in public places.

The plea was rejected by a bench constituted by Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Subramaniam Prasad.

Meanwhile, the petition claimed that the practice had created a serious menace in society as these pictures did not guarantee to prevent public urination and throwing garbage. Instead, people publicly urinate or spit on these "sacred images", the petition said.

"This seriously denigrates and disparages the sanctity of the sacred images. Fear is used as an element to stop people from urinating or spitting and littering. These things cannot be permitted over the element of pure devotion borne out of faith and freedom to practise and profess one's religion," petitioner and advocate Gorang Gupta said.

The plea said affixation of sacred images of deities on walls to prevent urination in public and spitting and throwing junk violated sections 295 (injuring or defiling place of worship with intent to insult the religion of any class) and 295A (deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs) of the Indian Penal Code as it hurt the religious sentiments of the general public.

The plea said the high court, in an earlier case, had acknowledged the menace of open public urination and, in its order, noted that religious sentiments of people were getting hurt due to the practice of affixing photographs of deities on walls.

-PTI Inputs