Mumbai: The Bombay High Court has imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on the Nashik jail superintendent for arbitrarily rejecting a prisoner’s parole application. The prisoner, Shrihari Rajlingam Guntuka, had sought parole in September 2024 for his wife’s surgery.
However, the jail superintendent rejected the application based on a 2022 government circular requiring a gap of 1.5 years between furlough and parole leave, despite lacking the authority to do so.
A bench of Justices Bharati Dangre and Manjusha Deshpande, on November 12 order, noted that the circular contradicted the Prisons (Bombay Furlough and Parole) Rules and previous court rulings.
The court reiterated that parole is a right for emergencies, stating: “A contingency like serious illness of a near relation, natural calamities like house collapse, flood, fire, and earthquake is unforeseen, and one cannot speculate when it will strike.”
The bench criticised the Nashik jailor for showing “disrespect to the law laid down by this court” by rejecting Guntuka’s application arbitrarily and failing to forward it to the competent authority. It termed the 21-day gap between Guntuka’s return from furlough and his parole application an unreasonable basis for denial.
“We strongly deprecate the approach adopted by the Nashik jailor in defeating the rights of the petitioner. The respondent No. 4 (jailor) has shown disrespect to the law laid down by this court,” the judges observed.
The court directed the jailor to forward Guntuka’s parole request to the appropriate authority and ordered a Rs25,000 fine to be paid personally to the prisoner within four weeks. It also instructed the Additional Chief Secretary of the state Home Department to ensure such violations are not repeated.
Highlighting repeated instances where jail authorities ignored court rulings, the bench expressed disappointment over the disregard for judicial orders in parole and furlough matters. “It is unfortunate that prison authorities have turned a deaf ear to the orders passed by courts and have continued to adopt their regime by rejecting applications,” the judges said.
