CPI(M) moves Madras High Court against removal of party flagpoles from public places

Communist Party of India (Marxist) State secretary P. Shanmugam has approached the Madras High Court against the action being taken by the State government officials across Tamil Nadu to remove party flagpoles from public places in compliance with a direction issued by a single judge in January this year.

Justice N. Anand Venkatesh, on Tuesday (July 15, 2025), accepted a request made by advocate R. Thirumoorthy for an early hearing of the writ petition filed by Mr. Shanmugam, who had challenged the Revenue department’s July 10 letter, and directed the High Court Registry to list the plea for hearing on Wednesday.

In his affidavit, the petitioner stated a single judge at the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court, had on January 27, ordered removal of all flagpoles erected by political parties, religious bodies, caste-based associations and others in all public places including lands belonging to the civic bodies, highways and other public institutions.

Even with respect to erection of flagpoles on private lands, the judge ordered that it could be done so only with permission and directed the State government to frame rules in that regard. Taking exception to such directions, Mr. Shanmugam said, it was an intolerant idea of democracy to remove flag poles.

Contending the CPI(M) had been the revolutionary vanguard of the working class in the country, the petitioner said, it was important both for the party as well as its affiliated body Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) to remain connected with the masses through the pictorial representations on their flags.

The petitioner said a Division Bench comprising Justices G.R. Swaminathan and K. Rajasekar had, on June 26, concurred with his contention that the single judge ought not to have passed such orders without affording an opportunity of hearing to the political parties since it violates the principles of natural justice.

The Division Bench had also referred the issue to the Chief Justice for constitution of a larger Bench which could pronounce an authoritative verdict. In the meantime, the single judge continued to monitor the implementation of his direction and about 19 Collectors reported to have removed 100% of flag poles from public places.

Since he insisted that the poles must be removed from the rest of the districts too, the Revenue department had written a letter to the Collectors of the remaining 19 districts which included Chennai, Madurai, Tiruchi and Coimbatore instructing them to remove all flag poles from public places before July 18.

Stating he came to know about the letter only on July 15, Mr. Shanmugam urged the court to quash it and issue a direction to the government officials to not take any coercive action until the issue gets decided by the larger Bench in view of the reference made by the Division Bench.