Summary
Kaushik, a lifer lodged in Tihar Jail moved a quasi habeas corpus petition bitterly complaining with facts and figures, of the terror and horror, physical, and psychic, let loose on him and other jail mates by a crypto criminal combination of senior officials and superior prisoners, thereby making the prison life within that walled world such a trauma and torment the law never meant under the sentence suffered at the hands of the Court. Briefly, the petitioner alleged that his life in jail is subjected to intimidation by overbearing 'toughs' inside, that he is forced to be party to misappropriation of jail funds by and bribery of officers, that homosexual and sexual indolence with the connivance of officials are going on, that smuggling in and out is frequent and drug racket common, that alcoholic and violent misconduct by gangs like those involved in Bank Robbery and other notorious cases are a menace to quieter prisoners and the whole goal of reformation of sentences is defeated by this supercrime syndrome. On this the Court appointed Sri Subodh Markedneya as amicus curiae to inquire into the allegations and submit a report. The respondent Delhi Administration transversed the grounds in the petition.
Allowing the petitions, the Court^HELD: 1. Prison torture is not beyond the reach of the Supreme Court in its constitutional jurisdiction. [931 F]Were there a modicum of truth in the disclosures made of vice and violence, overt and covert, in the goings on in Tihar such an institutional outrage would make our constitutional culture blush and our judicial punishment'guilty' procedure. And on the materials placed before the Court there is ground enough to exercise our exceptional but undoubted jurisdiction to ensure some minimum of social hygiene and banishment of licentious excesses lest the sentence of court be frustrated in its dual ends of deterrence and rehabilitation by prison pathology. [932 B-C]2. When police and prison torture is escalating in our human rights era, courts owe a duty to society not to ignore such a dangerous reality. Under our Constitution, deprivation of personal liberty as penal policy is purposive and the Penal Code itself is valid because the imprisonment of the criminal is reasonable, not arbitrary, and is sanctioned as a measure of social defence and individual rehabilitation. A court sentence does not deprive the prisoner of his fundamental rights. To reform and deter the criminal and to work out that process geared to social defence, the convict is cast into prison-not to make him more hardened, more brutal, more cunning and dangerous to society. This 930raison d'etre of penological institutions in our Gandhian country, with humanism as basic to the constitutional scheme, cannot be written off without peril. A Prison term in Tihar Jail is not a post graduate training in tough crime. No sentencing judge, high and low should hang his helpless head in frustration and humiliation because institutional alternations and personnel perversions have sullied and stultified the justice of his sentence. [932 F-H, 933 A, B, C]Sunil Batra v. State (Delhi Administration), [1980] 2SCR 557; referred to.3. The human rights of common prisoners are at a discount and, in our Socialist Republic moneyed 'B' class convicts operate to oppress the humbler inmates. There cannot be inequality in prison too on the score of social and financial status. Bank robbers in 'B' class because they are rich by robbery and nameless little men in 'C' class because they are only common Indians! Article 14 is suffocated if this classification is permitted, and yet that, according to rule itself, is prevalent. Therefore, the Supreme Court must act, will act, to restore the rule of the law and respect of the residual fundamental rights of any harassed petitioner. [933 D-F].4. The writ jurisdiction of the Supreme Court must be equal to the needs of human rights and human wrongs. In Sunil Batra (1) v. Delhi Administration, [1979] 1 S.C.R.393, this Court held that fundamental rights did not forsake prisoners and that the penological purpose of sentence was importantly, reformatory even though deterrent too. In the second Sunil Batra's case after a long discussion covering.American Rulings U.N. specifications of the Standard Minimum Rules for prisons and the implications of Articles 21, 19 and 14 read in the light of Maneka Gandhi's case, [1978] 1S.C.C. 248, this Court accented on the habilitative value contained in Rule 58 of the International Standard Minimum Rules. Jural justice thus set make the Court an activist instrument of jail Justice. [934 A-B, 935 A-B, 938 G]5. In the instant case, even after making a liberal allowance for adulteration and distortion, the miasmatic process and restore basic humanism inside this penal institution where sentences, punitively sent by court, are subjected to unbearable tensions and torments on their physical and moral fibre, thanks to the prison milieu being what it is. [938 G-H, 939 A]'B' class status for prisoners is going by averments in the petition, a pampering process much abused by officials and, in a 'class' culture, obnoxious to the Constitution.Equality before the law cannot co-exist with affluent blackguards being looked after with luxury and solicitude and lawly indigents being treated as pariahs inside the prison. There is reference in the petition to the three dangerous criminals involved in a big Bank Van Robbery Case being lodged in Ward 14 as 'B' Class VIPs, who have, on top of other advantages, certain facilities. It is fairly clear that many vices, including drug rackets, occasional violence, smuggling and trafficking in many other impermissible things, have hospitable home in this penitentiary. The Administration has conscientious responsibility for the decency and dignity, for correctional obligations and social hygiene inside prison houses and the time is long overdue for a thorough overhaul of the prison management in Tihar. [940 C-E, 941 E-F].6. The crisis in our prisons, the collapse of values in these campuses, the inner tension 'red in tooth and class'the corruption that makes for sensual indul- 931gences, the barbarities that harden the convicts and never heal them-all these processes can be reviewed and humanization resorted if, only if, our philosophy towards crime and punishment change. If vengeance is the spirit of punishment violence will be the prison way of life. [944 C-D][The Court, keeping in view the principle of natural justice and the limitation of Court time directed a judicial enquiry by the District and Sessions Judge of Delhi who is a member of the Board of Visitors stressing the points to be covered in particular.]See the full content of this document
Extract
Ramesh Kaushik VS. B. L. Vig, Superintendent And Anr.
PETITIONER: RAMESH KAUSHIK Vs.RESPONDENT: B. L. VIG, SUPERINTENDENT AND ANR.DATE OF JUDGMENT30/04/1980BENCH: KRISHNAIYER, V.R.BENCH: KRISHNAIYER, V.R.REDDY, O. CHINNAPPA (J)SEN, A.P. (J)CITATION: 1981 AIR 1767 1980 SCR (3) 929 1980 SCC Supl. 183ACT: Jail Jurisprudence-Prison torture and Constitutional Jurisdiction of the Court-Treatment for 'B' class and 'C'class in Tihar Jail whether offends Article 14 of the Constitution-Constitution of India Articles 21, 19 and 14.JUDGMENT: [ORIGINAL JURISDICTION: Writ Petition Nos. 393 & 549 of 1980.(Under Article 32 of the Constitution)S. Markendaya (Amicus Curiae) for the Petitioner.M. N. Abdul Khader and Miss A. Subhashini for the Respondents.The Judgment of the Court was delivered by.KRISHNA IYER J. Is a prison term in Tihar Jail a post- graduate course in crime? Such is the poignant issue that emerges from the facts of this case.'The fundamental human right is not to a legal system that is infallible but to one that is fair'-these great words of Lord Diplock in Maharaj v. Attorney General of Trinidad and Tobago (No.2) trigger our jurisdiction to ensure a fair legal deal to the prisoner whose petition to this Court makes frightening exposures about the insiders of Delhi's Central Jail.Kaushik, a 'lifer' (to use jail jargon), now lodged in the Tihar, Central Jail, has moved this quasi-habeas corpus petition wherein he bitterly complains with facts and figures, of the terror and horror, physical and psychic, let loose on him and other jail-mates by a crypto-criminal combination of senior officials and superior prisoners, thereby making the prison life within that walled world such a trauma and torment the law nev...
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