Mumbai: In order to trace the families of prisoners dying an ‘unnatural death’ in custody, the Bombay High Court recently ordered the Maharashtra government to file an affidavit spelling out the total number of such deaths in various jails across the state.
The HC has also sought details of the existing prisons and required jails. This comes after the HC was informed that at least 46 prisoners reportedly have died unnaturally, while in jail or police custody. The data was obtained from the National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB), by an advocate.
A bench of Chief Justice Pradeep Nandrajog and Justice Nitin Jamdar has also directed the government to file an affidavit giving details with necessary particulars of the inquest proceedings conducted, First Information Report (FIR) registered pertaining to these unnatural deaths, and also a brief summary of the postmortem report.
The bench had taken up a suo moto Public Interest Litigation (PIL) pursuant to the orders of the Supreme Court in September 2017. By its orders, the apex court had directed all the HC to identify the next of kin of the prisoners who have admittedly died an unnatural death in the prisons in Maharashtra during the period between 2012 and 2017.
The top court had further asked the HC to award suitable compensation to the families of the deceased unless adequate compensation is awarded to them.“Let an affidavit be filed indicating the number of prisons in the state, the sanctioned strength of the prisoners to be lodged therein, the actual number of prisoners lodged should also be disclosed,” CJ Nandrajog said.
“We need a separate table spelling out the particulars of new prisons to be established with capacity thereof and the likely period within which the prison complexes would be constructed be indicated,” CJ Nandrajog added. The bench has further directed the government to submit information on the sanctioned posts of personnel in the prison department with the number of posts filled up and vacant posts. The bench has given eight weeks time to file the affidavit.
