Coimbatore: Private agencies have failed to remove advertisement boards erected across city roads, despite the civic body issuing them notices It has been five months since the licence of advertisement boards has expired. The civic body issued notices to the agencies to remove the boards one-and-a-half months ago. But nothing significant has been done on the ground level.While the state and national highways have started to remove advertisement boards at traffic signal poles on their roads, the corporation is yet to start the drive and not a single board on the corporation road has been removed as on date.The notice issued by the corporation to the agencies on January 30 said, “As the license for the advertisement boards installed by the agency has expired on October 11, 2018, you are directed to remove the boards at traffic signal poles.”K Kathirmathiyon of Coimbatore Consumer Cause has filed a case in the Madras high court in this regard. He said, “Apart from issuing notices to the advertising agencies, the corporation has done nothing to remove the boards. It shows how committed the civic body is in following the rules and regulations.”The advertisement boards are placed only to attract the attention of the public. But when such boards are placed diagonally at the centre of a road, it would obviously attract the attention of commuters and cause accidents, he said.Quoting both the Indian Road Congress (IRC) norms and Tamil Nadu urban local bodies licensing of hoardings and levy and collection of advertisement tax rules, 2003, he said the advertisement boards should be placed in parallel to the roads and the boards should be placed 10 feet away from road margin and 100 feet away from junctions.“What is preventing corporation officials from removing the boards even after the expiry of license? Kathirmathiyon asked. The corporation is least bothered about the safety of the commuters.For no fault of theirs, the highways department is spending their own money to remove the advertisement boards and it is the corporation that should be held accountable for the violations, he said. If the corporation fails to act, contempt of court would be issued to the corporation.An official from the highways department said they did not give no-objection certificate (NOC) to anyone to install advertisement boards on highway roads and they have started to remove all the illegal advertisement boards and hoardings placed on their road.When contacted, a senior corporation official said they had issued notices to all the departments to remove the illegal advertisement boards and they were working jointly with other departments. “Gradually, we will remove all the advertisement boards.”

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