Mumbai, May 11 (TOI): The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the state government to grant licences to eight dance bars within two days, and asked the bar owners to give an undertaking that they would not engage employees with criminal antecedents near the dance area.

"It is directed that an undertaking shall be given by appellants who have filed application that they shall not engage employees in the bar and dance area whose names have been mentioned in the affidavit given by the state. The undertaking shall be issued by Wednesday and the licences shall be issued by day after tomorrow," a bench comprising Justices Dipak Misra and Shiva Kirti Singh said.

The state government had filed an affidavit in the court informing the bench that it had not granted licences to eight dance bars as it had emerged that some of their employees had criminal antecedents. Senior advocate Jayant Bhushan, appearing for Indian Hotel and Restaurant Association, said not a single licence has been issued. He submitted that as FIR has been lodged against some employees of the bars, licences were not being issued to them on the ground that they have criminal antecedents.

"Unless a person is convicted under the offence, he cannot be termed as a criminal. The licences are being delayed on one pretext on the other," he said. On the issue of increasing the height of railing adjacent to the dance stage, Bhushan said that such deficiencies have been addressed.

During the hearing, one of the counsel said that criminal antecedents of dancers should also be looked into and conditions be imposed on them. The court took strong note of this and said, "Are you trying to convey to us that they are criminals? Nobody can earn livelihood if they are convicted. We want to save the dignity of women. You want to take away means of their livelihood. Dignity of women has to be maintained and no obscenity of any kind would be allowed," the bench said.

The court has fixed the matter for further hearing on Friday. Earlier, the SC had rapped the state for not granting licences to dance bars on account of non-compliance of some of the conditions, and said it is better for women to perform than begging on the streets or doing something "unacceptable" for earning livelihood.

The bench, however, had acknowledged plea of Additional Solicitor General Pinky Anand, appearing for Maharashtra, that the state has to ensure that there is no obscenity at dance bars and the dignity of women is protected there.

It had asked all dance bars to get antecedents of their employees checked by the police, besides installing CCTV cameras at all entry points of dance bars. The court had also asked dance bars to adhere to conditions like there should be railings to demarcate performance area with the place where audience will sit.

Simultaneously, it had ordered the police not to ask the dance bar applicants to furnish NoCs from civic bodies, health and fire departments on the grounds that these documents must have been sought when the joints had come into being.

Prior to this, the court had rejected conditions such as providing live CCTV feed to police on the performances at dance bars and asked the state to grant licences to owners within 10 days after they complied with modified guidelines.