See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/342887405

Judicial Activism, Prison Management and Prisoners’ Rights in India: An

Analysis

Article  in  Journal of Critical Reviews · April 2020

DOI: 10.31838/jcr.07.14.127

CITATIONS READS

0 850

1 author:

Maneesh Yadav
GLA University
15 PUBLICATIONS   0 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Sanitation Conditions in U.P. Police Stations: An Empirical Study View project

Ease of Doing Business in Uttar Pradesh Evidence Based Research Study View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Maneesh Yadav on 10 August 2020.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 Journal of Critical Reviews
ISSN- 2394-5125 Vol 7, Issue 14, 2020

JUDICIAL ACTIVISM, PRISON MANAGEMENT AND PRISONERS’ RIGHTS IN INDIA:

AN ANALYSIS
Dr. Maneesh Yadav
Assistant Professor, Jaipuria Institute of Management, Lucknow
Email: maneeshyadav1982@gmail.com

Received:13.04.2020 Revised: 18.05.2020 Accepted: 17.06.2020

Abstract
Judiciary is the foremost pillar of democracy and the protection of sects of the society is the fundamental duty of any democratic
structure. As per government records, more than thirty-five thousand individuals are behind the bars. The ill-treatment of prisoners,
deprivation from the fundamental rights is very common in the country. Many inmates serve imprisonment only because of the lack
of legal support or lack of capital. Prison administration does not provide basic amenities like the right to religion, shelter, food,
clothes, recreation, etc. it is essential to the inmates to maintain physical and mental balance in life.
This study will try to identify the action of the Indian judiciary in the safekeeping of the fundamental civil liberties available to
prisoners and to provide basic amenities to prisoners. It will also study the prison reforms and activism of the judiciary in the
advancement of the prison conditions.

Keywords: Human Rights, Prison Management, Trial, Prisoner

© 2020 by Advance Scientific Research. This is an open-access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.31838/jcr.07.14.127

INTRODUCTION the constitutional basics are also accessible to a convict

In the preceding few decades human rights have become an
alive and vibrant issue at last in the free world. Numerous
developments associated therewith are certainly, indicators in
the route of human development. Veneration for the human
self-respect whereas shielding the lifespan and independence
entrusted to a human being available in the Constitution. It is
also evident in the international convention records. It was
tried by the legislature to ensure the rights of the accused
through the provisions of the Cr.P.C. and the Indian
Constitution. Up to the 19th century, inmates did not have any
legal shield regarding prisoners' life in the prison. The
ultimate goal of the prison system was to penalize the accused
because of his wrongdoing in the past. In the age of the English
dynasty, certain reformatory laws came in force in India to
control the prison management Vis a Vis rights of the
prisoners. Human rights fundamentally mean an entitlement
of the individuals on national, through constitutionally and
lawfully protected provisions for “capacity endowment” to
increase their life probabilities.
The organization of contemporary prison justice recognizes
that an individual does not forfeiture his rudimentary human
rights when placed in the prison. An individual may be liable
to be a shift in jail when he is shown guilty under the law of
having committed any crime in a punitive measure. Instead, a
person may be exposed to jail on an anxiety that he is probable
to generate a law enforcement problematic situation. In such
a case the imprisonment is preventive. The Supreme-Court of
India has undeniably commenced its campaign for jail reform.
But the fact leftovers that prisoners in India are by and large
deprived of human treatment. The result is that prisons in the
procedure of averting delinquency breed it. Providentially, the
Supreme Court declined to be a quiet viewer and propelled a
movement to defend the rudimentary rights of prisoners.
CONSTITUTIONAL PERSPECTIVE OF PRISONERS’ RIGHTS
Constitution of India is the recognized foundation of all laws in
the nation and is observed as the highest or the central law of
the land. Constitutional provisions like the Preamble, basic
privileges, etc. contain provisions intended at the shield of
human rights. The constitution of India is the lightening source
for all the navigators and its interpretations must imitate its
aims and objectives. “Life” in Article-21 of the constitution
defines the prolong meaning provided to every human being
and inhabitants imprisoned both i.e. under trials and
prisoners. They are also eligible to take advantage of the
assurances only up to some sensible constraint. Consequently,
without any discrimination.
Fundamental Rights and Prisoners
Part–III of the Indian constitution safeguards available to the
public of the nation, few rudimentary, usual and
unchallengeable rights. The goal of having a declaration of
fundamental rights is to make unbreakable few basic rights
relating to the individual and to keep them unpretentious by
the shifting majorities in legislatures. The courts have given a
very generous and complete clarification to the gist and
description of ‘state’ in Article-12 of the Constitution. It
contains each statutory or non-statutory authority which may
be observed as an agency of the state.
Protection in Respect of Conviction for Offences
Article-20 gives a shield concerning punishment meant for
crimes. The article establishes restrictions on the enclosed list
in the seventh schedule. It is available to all categories of
individual i.e. citizen and non-citizen. It does not forbid the
trial of offences under the ex post facto laws. Consequently,
Article-20(1) does not hit a law enacted after happening of
crime, prescribing a new procedure, diverse as of the normal
method for prosecution or trial. The safeguard enclosed in it
would be accessible only if the subsequent essentials are
assembled with the individual in question must be accused of
a “crime”. It means “any act or omission made punishable by
any law for the time being in force.” Constitutional provision
also offers fortification alongside “double jeopardy”. The
article is grounded on the common law aphorism “Nemo debet
bis vexan”, it says that anyone essentially should not be
exposed two times at risk for the same offence.
The individual must have been penalized subsequently his
trial in front of the court or a tribunal. The defense in
contradiction of “double jeopardy” enclosed in Article-20(2)
would be accessible simply when the suspect has been not
only impeached but also penalized after such trial. It is
analyzed that both prosecution and punishment must exist to
fulfill Article-20(2). Therefore, it follows that where a person
having been impeached for wrongdoing is cleared, he can be
impeached for the “similar wrongdoing” again. The apex court
decided that the succeeding trial was not barred because the
essential elements were not similar and facts were also
dissimilar.
Safety of Individual Freedom and Life expectancy
Article-21 provides to every individual safety of individual
freedom and life expectancy from the executive along with the

Journal of critical reviews 714

 JUDICIAL ACTIVISM, PRISON MANAGEMENT AND PRISONERS’ RIGHTS IN INDIA: AN ANALYSIS
legislature. It was also suggested that it can be removed on the
satisfactory conditions prescribed by the law. It was also
cleared that the procedure must be impartial, reasonable and
judicious. The apex judicial body has now several cases where
it criticized law enforcement agency on the issue of cruelty and
torture on convicts, suspects as well as individuals on whom
the trial is going on. Likewise, the apex judicial body has
witnessed that police department cruelty witnessed
“disastrous to our human rights awareness and humanist
constitutional order”. Judiciary has directly fixed and made the
government accountable to cure the circumstances. If it is
brought into being that the law enforcement agency has
maltreated a detainee, he would be directed to financial return
under Article-21.
PRISON ADMINISTRATION AND INDIAN COURT
The apex court has highlighted while explaining prison
conditions that basic of the Indian constitution “are available
to prisoners as well as free men. Prison wall do not keep our
Fundamental Rights.” Also, it was observed in a leading case of
Challa that:-
“A prisoner, be he a convict or under trail or a detenue does
not cease to be a human being. Even when lodged in jail, he
continues to enjoy all his fundamental rights including the
right to life guaranteed to him under the constitution. On being
convicted of a crime and deprived of their liberty in
accordance with the procedure established by law, prisoners
still remain the residue of constitutional rights”.
The court has specified quite a lot of directions to improve
numerous features of jail management and the circumstance
of inmates. The apex judicial body has powerfully denounced
the propensity of ongoing to keep individuals for extended
periods even after they have to turn out to be mentally stable.
The court has highlighted that in the prison a sufficient
number of facilities should be available to the mentally ill
prisoners. Also, the activity of transporting an unstable mind
to jail for safekeeping must be avoided because detention
home is scarcely a place for handling such individuals.
In Inder Singh v. State, the apex law court give out few
instructions as to how the prison system has to behave with
two young inmates sentenced to homicide and send to prison
for life, to improve convicts. The situation of the penitentiary
is wretched. To develop the state of affairs within jails, the
apex court formulated numerous propositions in the
judgment of Rama Murthy v. State of Karnataka. For instance,
it has been highlighted upon plummeting overpopulation in
jails and upon giving appropriate medicinal attention to the
convicts. Numerous prisons are huge over jam-packed than
the facilities planned for a far fewer figure of prisoners. In
Baber Singh case, the apex body specified subsequent rules
may be deliberated while taking way or declining the bail to
the accused. The autonomy of expression understanding and
writing provided to the inmates except in so far as it is
constrained by the circumstance of the sentence. Therefore, if
the convict is exposed to psychological cruelty or physical
infliction away from the genuine boundaries of legalized
custody the custodial system must substantiate their act by
making legitimate sanction or be accountable for the surplus.
In Prem v. Delhi Administration (1980) 3 SCC 526 it was stated
that arrested person or under-trial convict should not be
exposed to handcuffing in the absenteeism of explanatory
conditions. The police must inform the unexpected conditions
and take instructions from the court. He is permitted to
constitutional shield counter to dreadful conditions, so long as
life span lasts. It follows that in case of remarkably late
performance of a death sentence the convict is entitled to a
replacement of imprisonment of life as a substitute for death.
Conducting an impartial hearing for those who are accused of
criminal offences is the foundation of social equality. A
sentence resulting from a discriminating trial is contrary to
the theory of justice. The entitlement to an impartial judicial
process in a prosecution remains enshrined in Article- 21. The
concept of fair procedure also includes a reasonably prompt
judicial process. In a leading case of Hussainara Khatoon, apex
court laid down that the right to a rationally fast hearing was
Journal of critical reviews
an indispensable constituent of the right enclosed in the
Indian Constitution. The supreme judicial body has taken a
gigantic novelty pace in improving the management of
righteousness by symptomatic of that free legal assistance be
provided by the state to destitute prisoners serving
imprisonment.
The court of law has highlighted that the consultation from
legal representative facilities establishes a component of the
impartial process to a convict who is looking for his
deliverance through the court’s process. The court has also
invoked Article-39A which be responsible for free legal aid.
The responsibility of the government to offer for ‘free legal
service’ to an individual cannot be finished by saying that it is
incapable to deliver the similar because of monetary and
secretarial explanations. The law court also must-see and
notify the odd that he has an opportunity for legal
consultation. Advice from the attorney is the right of the
accused during the trial and before the commencement of the
trial. The prerequisite of notifying the individual as to why he
has been detained is not dispensed with by granting him bail.
As per the apex judicial body has witnessed in Senthil case:
“Whereas punitive incarceration is after trial on the
allegations made against a person, preventive detention is
without trial into the allegations made against him”.
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS
Prisoners are also human beings and have the right to live with
basic rights given in the Indian constitution. Different
categories of prisoner i.e. pre-trial, under-trial of convicted has
various rights during the jail period. Indian judiciary also gets
involved in various occasions to save the rights of the inmates.
It was also directed that in any case fundamental rights of any
individual cannot be curtailed in any given situation. The idea
behind protecting the rights of the prisoner is to strengthen
the philosophy behind the Indian Constitution. The Indian
apex judicial body has shown serious concern about the
malfunctioning of the prison administration and the facilities
available to the prisoner serving the term of imprisonment or
fighting for justice.
For the above study, it is suggested that jail administration
should be given time to time training for the proper
administration of the jail. A continuous monitoring system is
the major requirement of the current system. The report
should be sent to the central administration from time to time.
REFERENCES:
1. Jain, M.P. (2003). Indian Constitutional law. (8th ed.).
Wadhwa and Company Nagpur.
2. Chowdhury, Nitai Roy. (2002). Indian Prison Laws and
correction of Prisoners. Deep & Deep Publications.
3. Kumar, Narendra.(2002). Constitutional law of India. (9th
ed.). Allahabad Law Agency.
4. Laski, Harold J. (1979).A Grammar of Politics. (5th ed.).
Routledge, UK.
5. Ahmad, Zaffer. 1993, Custodial Violence: An Embargo on
Prison reforms. Civil and military law Journal, page
no.182.
6. I.C, Saxena. (1990). Social Justice in Quasi Contract. Journal
of Indian Law Institute, Vol. 32, page no.168.
7. Sheela Barse v. State of Maharashtra, 1988(1) Bom CR 58
at p- 69.
8. State of Andhra Pradesh v. Challa Ramkrishna Reddy. AIR
(2000) SC 2083
9. A.K. Gopalan v. State of Madras AIR (1950) SC 27
10. R.D. Shetty v. Inter Airport Authority AIR (1979) SC 1628
11. Maqbool Hussain v. State of Bombay AIR (1953) SC 325
12. Shiv Bahadur v. State of Vindhya Pradesh AIR (1953) SC
394
13. State of M.P. v. Veereshwar Rai, AIR (1957) SC 592
14. A.A. Mullah v. State of Maharashtra AIR (1997) SC 1441
15. Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India AIR (1978) SC 597
16. Raghubir Singh v. State of Haryana AIR (1980) SC 1087
17. Mohan Lal Sharma v. State of U.P. (1989)2 SCC 314
18. T.V. Vetheeswaran v. State of T.N. AIR (1983) SC 361(2) :(
1983)2 SCC 68.
715
 JUDICIAL ACTIVISM, PRISON MANAGEMENT AND PRISONERS’ RIGHTS IN INDIA: AN ANALYSIS

19. Gurdev Singh and others v. State of H. P. 1991(2) Sun, L.C.

293 p-245
20. State of A.P. v. Challa RamKrishna Reddy (2000)5 SCC 712
21. Sunil Batra v. Delhi Adm. AIR (1980) SC 1579 (II): (1980)2
SCC 488
22. Veena Sethi v. State of Bihar AIR (1983) SC 339: (1982) 2
SCC 583
23. State of Gujarat v. Hon’ble High-Court of Gujarat AIR
(1998) SC 3164.
24. Sunil v. Delhi Administration (II), AIR (1980) SC 1579
25. Sunil v. State of M.P. (1990) 2 SCJ 409.
26. Javed v. State of Maharashtra AIR (1985) SC 231
27. State of Punjab v. Baldev Singh AIR (1999) SC 2378.
28. Varkey Joseph v. State of Kerala, AIR (1993) SC 1892
29. M.H. Hosket v. State of Maharashtra AIR (1978) SC 1548
30. State of Maharashtra v. Manubhai Pragaji Vashi AIR
(1996) SC 1
31. Superintendent of Legal Affairs, W.B. v. S.Bhowmick AIR
(1981) SC 917
32. State of M.P. v. Shobharam AIR (1966) SC 1966 SC 1920
(1917)
33. State of T.N. v. Senthil Kumar, AIR (1999) SC 971: (1999)2
SC 646
34. Hussainara Khatoon v. Home Secretary, Bihar AIR (1979)
SC 1360
35. Venkatram v. Union of India AIR (1954) SC 375

Journal of critical reviews 716

View publication stats