Supreme Court Issues Notice To NCRB On Collection Of Caste-Data Of Prisoners

The Supreme Court on February 18 issued notice to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) to implead it as a party in the ongoing suo moto proceedings to monitor the direction of compliance of the October 4, 2024, Sukanya Shantha judgment.It was submitted by Senior Advocate Dr S. Muralidhar that in the judgment, the Court passed specific direction (para XX, 231, no. (iv) of judgment) for deleting the "caste" column and any references to caste in undertrial and/or convicts' prisoners' registers inside the prisons shall also stand deleted. The amicus then filed an application in terms of this direction, stating that the direction to delete caste columns should not preclude the NCRB from collecting statistics on caste inside the prisons. On November 7, 2024, as pointed out by Dr. Muralidhar, the Court clarified that the NCRB can continue doing this exercise.Considering this request and the need for the NCRB to file a compliance report in this regard, a bench of Justices JB Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan issued notice to it. The Court ordered: "Learned amicus brought to our notice direction no. XX(iv) reads thus..the learned amicus thereafter brought our attention to order passed dated November 7, 2024, and the same reads thus..the NCBR is before us. Issue notice to NCRB and more particularly, in view of the order passed by this Court." Further, pursuant to the January 27 order giving the last opportunity to the States and Union Territories to file compliance reports of the directions issued in Sukanya Shantha judgment, a status report was filed. As per the Status Report, Telangana, Haryana, Punjab, NCT of Delhi, Manipur, Assam and Chattisgarh are yet to file compliance affidavits. During the hearing, it was pointed out that these States and UT have filed compliance although the same was not reflected in the office report. However, the NCT of Delhi and Chattisgarh are the only remaining. Therefore, the Court has given one more week for the NCT of Delhi to file the affidavits. Last year, while observing that discrimination inside prisons based on grounds of caste, gender, and disability is illegal, the Court initiated a suo moto proceedings tilted In Re: Discrimination Inside Prisons in India.A bench headed by the then Chief Justice of India Dr D.Y. Chandrachud comprising Justices Pardiwala and Manoj Misra had pronounced the judgment declaring the provisions under the respective Prison Manuals/Rules of States and Union Territories perpetrating caste-based segregation of prisoners as violative of Articles 14, 15, 17, 21 and 23 of the Indian Constitution.The Court has passed the following directions:i. All States and Union Territories are directed to revise their Prison Manuals/Rules within 3 months of this judgment.ii. The Union Government is directed to make necessary changes to address caste-based discrimination in the Model Prison Manual 2016 and the Model Prisons and Correctional Services Act, 2013 within 3 months of this judgment.iii. The "caste" column and any reference to caste in the undertrial and/or convict prisoners register inside the prison shall be deleted.iv. The Court has initiated suo moto proceedings from now onwards as In Re: Discrimination Inside Prisons in India. On the first date of hearing of the suo moto petition, all States and the Union Government shall file a compliance report of the judgment.v. Reference to "habitual offenders" in the Prison Manual/Model Prison Manual shall be per the definition provided in the respective State legislations. The definition of habitual offender provided in most States' legislations more or less definite them as 'referring to a person who has been sentenced on conviction for at least three occasions to “a substantive term of imprisonment” for any or more of the specified offences'.This direction is regarding a reference often made to the tribes who were considered criminals under the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871 but were later denotified under the Habitual Offenders Act, 1952. The Court has said that all other references made to the definition of habitual offenders are declared unconstitutional. Alternatively, it had directed the Union and State Government to make necessary changes in manual/rules in line with the judgment within 3 months.vi. The Police has been directed to follow guidelines issued in The Police is directed to follow the guidelines issued in Arnesh Kumar v. State of Bihar (2014) and Amanatullah Khan v. The Commissioner of Police, Delhi (2024) to ensure that members of Denotified Tribes are not subjected to arbitrary arrest.Case Details: IN RE: DISCRIMINATION INSIDE PRISONS IN INDIA| SMW(C) No. 10/2024Appearances: Senior Advocate S Muralidhar and Advocate Disha Wadekar appeared for Shantha

Supreme Court Issues Notice To NCRB On Collection Of Caste-Data Of Prisoners

Gursimran Kaur Bakshi

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