Last month, Judge of the High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, and executive chairman, Jammu and Kashmir legal services authority, Justice Tashi Rabstan inspected the prison premises at the high-security Kot Bhalwal jail in Jammu.
Justice Tashi Rabstan was informed by the jail superintendent that the prison is currently overcrowded as it is holding over 10 per cent more prisoners than its normal capacity. Justice Tashi Rabstan was also intimated about the shortfall in the sanctioned strength of the staff. Of the 999 inmates in the prison, there are 579 undertrials, making for nearly 58% of all inmates.
The only relief is that this figure is a tad lower than the national average. India’s overcrowded prisons is an issue that has rarely, if ever, incited passions or been the subject of debate. It is a problem that is known to all, lamented by a few, and then left to be, untouched and unfixed. Of the over five lakh inmates in Indian prisons, majority are those under trial for crimes they had allegedly committed.
The figure is 77% to be precise. Our nation has the sixth highest share of pre-trial detainees in the world, according to data collated by the World Prison Brief. The five countries that fare worse than India are Liechtenstein, San Marino, Haiti, Gabon and Bangladesh. If you are wondering, no, this large share of the under-trial prison population is not a recent phenomenon, but has persisted for decades now.
A Law Commission report from 1979 noted that the share of those in pre-trial detention was 57.6% as of January 01, 1975. Last year, in her maiden Constitution Day address on November 26 at the Supreme Court, President Droupadi Murmu flagged the plight of people, arrested for petty offences, languishing in jails despite being granted bail, saying they remain incarcerated despite getting bail for lack of money to furnish the bail amount or arrange sureties. Three days later, the Supreme Court had directed prison authorities across the country to provide details of such prisoners within 15 days to National Legal Services Authority for formulating a national scheme for their release.
Very recently, the National Legal Services Authority told the Supreme Court that as per recent data about 5,000 undertrial prisoners were in jails despite being granted bail and 1,417 of them have been released. The report said one of the main reasons why the accused are in jail despite the grant of bail is that they are accused in multiple cases and are not willing to furnish bail bonds until they are given bail in all the cases, as under trial custody will be counted in all the cases.
It said wherever the reason for non-release is due to inability to furnish bonds or surety, the NALSA would be following up those cases and hopefully in the next couple of weeks, more UTPs would be able to get out of the prison. While this sounds like a good beginning, the focus needs to be put on the deep-rooted problems. The predisposition to arrest in the short term rather than investigate for the long haul of conviction is one of the reasons why many bail cases come to court in the first place and add to the numbers that choke the system.
