SC expands committee scope to address aspects relating to women prisoners

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday expanded the scope of the district level committees, which it has ordered to be constituted to assess the infrastructure and current capacity of jails across the country, so that issues related to women prisoners are addressed holistically.

The apex court, which had last week taken cognisance of the allegation about several women prisoners in West Bengal getting pregnant while in jail, said the senior most lady judicial officer in the district may be included in the panel.

A bench of Justices Hima Kohli and and Ahsanuddin Amanullah, which is hearing a matter titled ‘Inhuman conditions in 1,382 prisons’, had on January 30 issued directions for constituting a committee in each district in every state and Union Territory for assessing the available infrastructure in jails and take a decision on the number of additional prisons to be constructed.

It had directed each state and UT to set up a committee comprising principal/district judge, district magistrate, senior superintendent/superintendent of police, secretary of the District Legal Services Authority and jail superintendent.

During the hearing on Friday, senior advocate Gaurav Agrawal, who is assisting the top court as an amicus curiae in the matter, told the bench about the details received by him from the Additional Director General and Inspector General, Correctional Services, West Bengal, regarding children born to women prisoners while in custody.

Agrawal referred to an application filed by him in which he has said that as per the details received from West Bengal authorities, 62 babies were born in the state jails over the last four years and most of the women inmates who gave birth to them were expecting when brought to prison.

‘Quite a few carried pregnancy when they came (to jails),’ the bench observed while referring to the application.

The bench was informed that only female staff were deployed in women’s jails or barracks in the state and there are CCTV cameras all across the prisons. ‘In spite of this, if something is happening then it is worse,’ the bench said.

The amicus also referred to the aspects of hygiene, security measures, health care infrastructure and welfare of women prisoners. The bench sought responses from all the states and UTs on the issues raised by the amicus in his application for directions and posted it for hearing on April 9.

‘The undersigned has received information from ADG & IG correctional services, West Bengal on February 10, 2024 at 5:32 pm for last 4 years of all child births in the jails in West Bengal, which indicates that there were 62 children born in the jails in West Bengal during the last 4 years,’ he said in the application.