Jagannath Sena launches shoe polish drive to submit Rs 1 lakh fine in Supreme Court

Jagannath Sena has called upon people to join its shoe polish drive so that Rs 1 lakh penalty imposed by the Supreme Court on the petitioners of the Jagannath corridor project can be collected and submitted in the apex court. 

The outfit’s convenor Priyadarshana Pattnaik also urged the common people to beg for the cause and collect Re1 from each. He has made it clear that the outfit would not receive more than Re1 collected from either begging or shoe polishing. When we are able to collect Rs1 lakh, we will submit it in Supreme Court.”

Patnaik continued: “Lord Jagannath does not have hands. He cannot pay fine. So His devotees will have to pay the fine amount on behalf Lord Jagannath.”

He further said “Odisha government has agreed not to carry out excavation work around the temple thanks to our petitions. Also, it has agreed to consult with Archaeological Survey of India for the future work related to the Jagannath Corridor project. So we got our demands fulfilled. But we could not digest the fine imposed on petitioners. That’s why we came up with these drives.” 

Notably, the Supreme Court quashed the petitions challenging the digging and construction work being undertaken by the Odisha government around Jagannath temple as part of the Jagannath corridor project terming it frivolous and imposed a penalty of Rs 1 lakh on each of the petitioners.