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Demarcate K'taka-AP border in Ballari, SC tells Centre

Last Updated 17 September 2018, 18:59 IST

The Supreme Court on Monday told the union government to complete the process of demarcating the boundary at the ground level between Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka around the iron ore-rich belt of the Ballari forest reserve area.

The top court gave six months’ time to the Centre, even as the Andhra Pradesh government expressed reservations on a final report given by the Surveyor General and the Karnataka government accepted it.

A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta refused to take on record objections to the report on behalf of some mining companies, represented by Krishnan Venugopal and others.

The bench asked Additional Solicitor General Pinky Anand as to how much time will the Centre take to implement the report. On her submission that it would take four to five months in implementing the report on demarcation of boundary, the court put the matter for further consideration after six months.

Senior advocate A K Ganguly, appearing for Andhra Pradesh, sought to put forth objections to the report, but the court declined to consider the plea.

“We are not going to demarcate the boundary ourselves. It is for the Government of India to implement the report,” the bench said.

“Karnataka accepts the report. Andhra Pradesh has some reservations. The Union of India is to demarcate the boundary based on the report. The Union government should implement the report,” the bench said in its order.

During the hearing, advocate Anitha Shenoy, appearing for the Karnataka government, submitted that every objection has been taken on record in the report.

The court had earlier directed for a joint field exercise to demarcate the boundary between the two states, while expressing its strong displeasure that the work for it had not been completed even after passage of so much time, as the first order in this regard was passed on March 22, 2010.

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(Published 17 September 2018, 18:45 IST)

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