Sankranthi is coming. People would like to fly Kites and also cut them with the Manja. But there is a nationwide ban on the manja. Shopkeepers expressed their displeasure over the nationwide ban on the procurement, sale and use of glass-coated ‘manja’, saying the legal prohibition should have been brought a year ago.
“Business will suffer a blow as a result of NGT’s Public interest litigation (PIL) in Supreme Court to ban glass-coated kite-strings. If a ban had to be implemented, it should have been done a year ago and not days before the peak time of their business,” a shopkeeper said.
The apex court had agreed to hear a plea seeking a nationwide ban on the procurement, sale and use of glass powder-coated ‘manja’. The top court had earlier asked petitioners, who in a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) sought a ban on ‘manja’ as it resulted in more than 50 deaths in the last two years, to approach the NGT with their plea.
