‘Releasing 11K from prison a good move’

Following a directive of the Supreme Court (SC), the state may release 11,000 undertrials and convicts booked for offences for which the prescribed punishment is less than seven years on either parole or interim bail, for a period of 45 days or until the Epidemic Diseases Act is withdrawn. Government sources said prisons across the state have started screening lists of prisoners.

On March 23, the SC ordered all states and Union Territories to constitute high-powered committees that would consider the release of undertrials and certain convicts to decongest jails as the country is battling a Covid-19 outbreak.

Experts have welcomed the move. MN Singh, former commissioner of Mumbai Police, said, “Seventy percent [of prisoners] are undertrials and await trial. Majority of them are involved in non-serious cases.” Praveen Dixit, former director general of police, Maharashtra, also said releasing certain prisoners would be a good move, provided conditions were imposed. “To overcome jumping bail, the state should implement electronic bracelets for these persons,” said Dixit.

Professor Vijay Raghavan from the Centre for Criminology and Justice at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) said overcrowding in jails is a serious concern when the state needs to restrict the spread of Sars-Cov-2, which causes Covid-19. “It is impossible to have social distancing in prisons with the current levels,” he said.

Raghavan also said the Maharashtra prison department had already been considering releasing certain prisoners before the lockdown and that as per the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), police do not necessarily have to arrest someone booked for an offence for which the punishment is less than seven years.