New Delhi: The Delhi government Friday told the Delhi High Court that out of 3,200 undertrials who were out of jail due to extension of their interim bail orders on account of the second wave of COVID-19, 45 (1.4 per cent) have been re-arrested for different crimes, which is not a significant number.
A bench of Justices Vipin Sanghi, Rekha Palli and Talwant Singh, which was hearing a suo motu case on the extension of interim court orders, was informed by Delhi government counsel Santosh Kumar Tripthai that the authorities have been quantifying the data of arrested prisoners .
3,200 undertrial prisoners (UTPs) were released this year i.e the second wave of COVID-19. Out of these 45 were arrested for different crimes. It is not a significant number, he said.
Last month, the court had taken note of rising crime rate in the national capital and asked the Delhi government to file a status report on the impact of its orders extending interim bails granted to undertrials and convicts to decongest jails to contain the spread of COVID-19.
In its status report, the Delhi government said that the prison department has already requested police to file a separate report after analysing the law and order situation in the national Capital.
The government, in the status report, thus prayed that some more time be granted to put on record police's status report with regards the impact of law and order.
The counsel also informed the court that petition before the Supreme Court pertaining to the decongestion of prisons on account of COVID-19 was still pending.
The court adjourned the hearing in the plea till September 4 while extending all interim orders which are scheduled to expire in cases before it as also the district courts.
The court took up the matter suo motu earlier this year as it had done in March last year when the lockdown was in place in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak.
In its order on April 20, the bench had made it clear that the interim orders were being extended till July 16 or further orders except where the Supreme Court may have passed any contrary orders in any such matter during this period. The interim orders were then given further extensions on July 16 and July 27.