Prisons Reforms | Supreme Court Directs Constitution Of District Committees Across India To Report On Existing, Required Jail Infrastructure

In a public interest litigation (PIL) initiated to address the issue of overcrowding of prisons in India, the Supreme Court today directed States/Union Territories to constitute District-level Committees, which shall assess and report on available infrastructure in jails and give a decision on the number of additional jails required in terms of the Model Prison Manual, 2016.

The Bench of Justices Hima Kohli and A Amanullah ordered that the governments of the States/UTs shall notify constitution of the Committees within 1 week from the date of receipt of the court's order and the Committees shall hold their first meeting within 2 weeks of their constitution. The said Committees will consist of the Principal/District judge (Chairperson of the District Legal Services Authority), Member Secretary (DLSA), District Magistrate (in-charge of the particular District), Superintendent of Police, and Superintendent(s) of Jails.

The Court further directed the Committees to "initiate steps to examine the requirement of expanding the existing jails and acquiring land to set up new jails within the Districts depending on current capacity, occupancy and the future demands of the Districts." They were permitted to examine the needs of respective Districts, with the future projections factoring in a period of atleast 50 years for implementation.

It was added: "The Committees will also take into account the status of the ongoing projects/proposals that are pending within the Departments to ensure that milestones are set for completing the ongoing projects and wherever a project has to take off for want of land, take steps to identify the land for purposes of acquisition, and place a report before the Chief Secretary for obtaining necessary approvals and fast-tracking the process."

The court also stipulated that the Committees shall keep in mind the requirement of AI and the institution of video-conferencing towards mulakat.

The matter is now posted for April 9, 2024.

Notably, on the last date, the court had asked the States/UTs to furnish details of their respective territories on the (i) number of jails presently setup, (ii) sanctioned capacity and actual capacity of the jails, (iii) current requirement to set up more jails and the steps initiated and (iv) stage at which such plans were for setting up more jails. Advocate Gaurav Agrawal, appearing as Amicus Curiae in the matter, was asked to collate the data and place it before the court in tabulated form.

In furtherance, the Amicus placed a compilation before the court, relaying data of existing jails in the States/UTs and the responses of the States/UTs regarding steps initiated to setup more jails. On perusing the same, the Bench noted that there was hardly any proposal that had come forth from the States of Bihar, Rajasthan, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh.

Anguished by the non-compliance of the last order, it imposed a cost of Rs.10,000 each on States of Maharashtra and Jharkhand.

Underlining the issues inhering in the responses filed, it was said,

"In some cases, information has been furnished collectively instead of giving a breakdown of the capacity/occupancy of the jails which makes it difficult for this court to assess the extent of occupancy on a jail-wide scale. Further, in some cases, it has simply been stated by the State government that work is under progress for constructing more jails without giving the details regarding state of the said progress, which is of no use."

The Bench remarked that the figures presented were stark and needed to be addressed on top priority. 

Background

On June 13, 2013, former CJI RC Lahoti wrote a letter to the then CJI relating to the disturbing conditions in prisons. He invited attention to the inhuman conditions prevailing in 1382 prisons in India as reflected in a Graphic Story appearing in Dainik Bhaskar (National Edition) on March 24, 2013. On July 5, 2013 the letter was registered as a PIL, wherein the Social Justice Bench passed an order requiring the Union of India to furnish certain information primarily relating to the more serious issue of over-crowding in prisons and improving the living conditions of prisoners.

In February, 2016, the Social Justice bench issued extensive guidelines on prison reforms, intending that they would prison population and enhance living conditions of prisoners. Subsequently, however, it was brought to the notice of the court that the problem of overcrowding in jails, which encompassed issues of hygiene, management, sanitation, etc., continued to persist and had rather become pathetic. Some States/UTs suffered with overcrowding of jails to the extent of 150 percent or more.

Over the course of hearings, the court directed States/UTs to prepare Action Plans for reducing prison population. In 2018, it asked States/UTs to consider the feasibility of establishing open prisons in as many locations as possible. "We expect the State Governments concerned to not only try and utilize the existing capacity of these open prisons and if necessary increase the existing capacity of these open prisons in due course of time", the court said at the time.

Case Title: Re-Inhuman Conditions In 1382 Prisons v. Director General of Prisons and Correctional Services and Ors., W.P.(C) No. 406/2013

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