DT Next Impact: Conditions for bail should not be rigid, Madras HC tells lower courts
HC registrar general told to ensure effective communication of bail orders to jails concerned
Madras High Court (File)
CHENNAI: Raising serious concerns over the conditions imposed by the lower courts in granting bail to prisoners, the Madras High Court opined that no lower court should impose stringent bail conditions on poor prisoners.
What is the use of granting bail if the detainees could not execute the bail conditions, wondered a division bench of Justice SM Subramaniam and Justice M Jothiraman, while hearing suo motu proceedings based on the DT NEXT report that exposed the plight of several hundreds of prisoners languishing in jail despite being granted bail.
Additional public prosecutor (APP) R Muniyapparaj submitted that the State is implementing the central government scheme to provide financial assistance to poor prisoners and issued an order in this regard in February.
He also submitted that in most of the cases, bail orders from district courts are not properly communicated to jails concerned. This is the main reason for the prisoners languishing in jail even after getting bail, he said.
After the submission, the bench directed the registrar general of the high court to ensure the effective communication of bail orders to the jails concerned and to accelerate the process to prevent prisoners from languishing in jail after getting bail. The bench also suo motu impleaded the Chief Secretary of the Puducherry government in this regard.
The legal services authority submitted that swift actions will be taken in coordination with the high court registry and necessary legal aid assistance will be provided to the prisoners across the State.
The bench directed the State to file a report in this regard and to complete the process expeditiously within three weeks and posted the matter on January 6, 2025.
On November 13, DT NEXT published a report highlighting that over 800 prisoners were languishing in various prisons even after being granted bail.
Following the news report, the bench initiated the suo motu proceedings and directed the State to submit a report regarding the prisoners languishing in jail.
Observing that the prisoners’ number is inflated, the State refused DT NEXT's report and submitted a report stating that 153 remand prisoners and 22 convicted prisoners are languishing in several jails after being granted bail and suspension of sentence respectively.