Non-compliance with stringent guidelines a sticking point; matter comes up in SC today.
Mumbai : Not a single dance bar in Mumbai has been able to comply with the set of 26 guidelines that have been issued by the state government for those who want to restart their bars after the Supreme Court declared that the ban on them was unconstitutional.
The matter is coming up in the Supreme Court on Wednesday. Chief among the guidelines laid down by the state government was sourcing of live feed from the bars to the local ACP office; also, the location of the dance stage is to be at least five feet from the customers, and surrounded by a 3 ft grill.
These bars had been banned by the state government in 2005 following which they had gone to court. The High Court had then ruled that such a ban was unconstitutional since it went against the performing artists’ right to livelihood. Again, the state government went to the Supreme Court, which upheld the HC judgment and ruled that these bars should be allowed to reopen, and that the administration can set some preconditions to prevent obscenity.
When asked about the pre-conditions, senior police inspector Sadashiv Shelar, who is in charge of granting the licenses, said that there are 26 guidelines for restarting the establishments.
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“The chief among these is that there should be live feed from the dance bars to the office of the local additional commissioner of police, so that it is possible to monitor their activities,” he said. Also, the dancers will perform on a stage that will be located at a distance of least five feet from the customers; and at a time only four dancers will be allowed on stage. Further, there will be a grill of three feet all around the stage and there will be no mingling of the dancers with the customers at any point of time, Shelar said.
“It has also been laid down that the dancers will not be dressed in an obscene manner and their dance movements will not be provocative, in any way,” the officer said. Also, the application should be in the name of the existing owner, if he is still alive, or else this will be treated as a new license.
The officer said that initially about 157 bars had applied for a license for restarting their dance bars following the SC ruling. After this, they were told to submit a report saying that they have complied with all the 26 guidelines so that it could be further verified by the local police station.”However, not a single bar owner has come forward since then with a compliance report, and this is the information that will be presented to the Supreme Court in Wednesday’s hearing,” he added.
Pravin Agarwal, president of an association that fights for the rights of bar owners, said that it is not possible for new bar owners to meet these guidelines, and hence none of them applied. ‘‘In the city, we have severe space shortage, it is simply not possible to have a space of five feet between the customers and the dancers, since this will eat into the seating area,” he said. Further, having a grill of three feet above the stage area will mean that some of the dancers who are short in height will not even be seen by the customers; then, the very purpose of seeing a dance performance gets defeated, it is pointed out.
Another dance bar owner, Ramanna Shetty, from Kandivali (W), said that if the bars have to be fitted with closed circuit television cameras, and a live feed has to be sent to the additional police commissioner’s office, then no one will want to sit at such a place. “No customer will feel comfortable if a live feed is being seen by the police; this is almost as if the state government does not want us to start dance bars again,” he pointed out.
The bar owners hope to explain all these problems to the apex court, which may also offer a solution, Shetty added.
There are around 75,000 persons who are associated with this business: dancers, waiters, tailors who stitch dresses for the dancers, beauticians, and even auto rickshaw drivers who ferry the dancers to their hotels at a late hour.
