Prisons of Assam, 3 other States under Gauhati High Court scanner

STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: The prisons in Assam, Nagaland, Mizoram, and Arunachal Pradesh have come under the scrutiny of the Gauhati High Court. The Court has directed the Inspector General of Prisons, Assam; the Director-General of Prisons, Nagaland; the Inspector General of Prisons, Mizoram and the Inspector General of Prisons, Arunachal Pradesh to file their personal affidavits giving details on prisons in their respective States.

A division bench of the High Court comprising Chief Justice Ajai Lamba and Justice Soumitra Saikia has asked the prison authorities of the four States to give the following details of prisons under their respective jurisdictions:

(i) How many jails are in existence in their respective States?

(ii) The sanctioned capacity in each of the jails;

(iii) The actual number of prisoners housed in each jail;

(iv) Crimes reported from each jail, committed at the instance of the jail authorities or private persons, or at the instance of authorities that supervise jails;

(v) Whether vocational training, libraries, handloom and handicraft and other such activities have been provided in jails;

(vi) The number of overcrowded jails via-a-vis their sanctioned capacities;

(vii) Whether each of the jails is appropriately staffed;

(viii) Whether jail hospitals/clinics are provided in accordance with Model Prisons Manual, 2016;

(ix) Whether jail wards have been provided medical facilities?

(x) To what extent is ‘Model Prisons Manual-2016’ adopted: or implemented in each of the jails?

(xi) Whether ideal conditions have been provided for jail inmates to meet their family members; and

(xii) Whether a separate room has been provided for advocates who want to meet their clients/inmates, or for free legal aid purposes in each jail?

The development came in the hearing of four writ petitions (all ‘Suo Moto’) on conditions prevailing in jails in the four States either on account of overcrowding or understaffing, or inadequate jail infrastructure, or for providing vocational training to jail inmates; or for incidents of human rights violations in the jails; and whether the directions/observations issued by the Supreme Court of India in W.P.(C) No. 406 of 2013 have been complied with.

However, for the ease of judging and for pragmatic purposes, the bench would be dealing with W.P.(C) (Suo Moto) No. 8 of 2018 only, rather than calling for reply of various authorities in various petitions under consideration.

The bench said that once the reports are received, the Court would constitute a Commission of Persons from the Society and members of the Bar to visit each of the jails to verify whether the information furnished is factually correct.

Barring W.P.(C) (Suo Moto) No. 8 of 2018 that has been listed for April 21, 2020, the other three petitions have been disposed of.

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