“Orders were issued from time to time by the former Chief Secretary, in the capacity of the Chairperson of the State Executive Committee, imposing restrictions to be adhered to during the second wave of the pandemic without there being any deliberation with the other members of the Committee, who happened to be bureaucrats having their offices in the same building where the Chief Secretary has his office. Since there were no meetings of the State Executive Committee, minutes of meetings though required to be recorded in terms of statutory rules were not recorded. Although at an earlier stage it was submitted that as the Chairperson of the Committee the former Chief Secretary had certain emergency powers and to take decisions all by himself, we have observed from the records produced yesterday by Mr. Anturkar that none of the orders recorded any emergent like situation warranting the Chairperson of the Committee to pass an order without waiting for deliberations with the other members,” the bench observed.Vandana Sonawane, member of the zonal railway users’ consultative committee and the Maharashtra Mahila Pravasi Sangh, welcomed the HC’s observations and expressed full agreement with them.“Especially with cases of covid-19 decreasing at a rapid pace the government needs to realise that it is high time train travel were made available to all. Only the aged and the elderly are completely vaccinated but these are not the people who have to go out and earn livelihoods. It is the young people who need to go to work or go to their educational institutions. The youth of the state has suffered a lot in the pandemic with most working professionals having had to take severe pay cuts. My own daughter, who is an MBA graduate, is currently earning only rupees 12000 per month. People are now fully aware and are more careful as compared to earlier. They will definitely take all precautions while travelling but cutting off such a crucial mode of transport cannot be the answer,” she said.
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