Death-row convicts should be entitled to meet family, lawyers: SC

By PTI |New Delhi |Updated: December 13, 2018 9:56:48 pm 

A bench headed by Justice Madan B Lokur said this while dealing with an application which had said that prisoners sentenced to death by any court have a right to be treated at par with other convicted prisoners and should be provided all similar facilities as are provided to others in jail.

Justice Madan B Lokur

The Supreme Court Thursday said death-row convicts should be entitled to meet family members, lawyers and mental health professionals so that their rights are adequately protected at all stages. A bench headed by Justice Madan B Lokur said this while dealing with an application which had said that prisoners sentenced to death by any court have a right to be treated at par with other convicted prisoners and should be provided all similar facilities as are provided to others in jail. The application had also sought a direction that solitary confinement of death row convicts or their separate and cellular confinement be struck down as unconstitutional. The bench requested the Justice (retd) Amitava Roy committee, constituted by the apex court to look into aspects of jail reforms across India, to look into the issues raised in the application in “greater depth”. 

The bench, which also comprised Justices S Abdul Nazeer and Deepak Gupta, observed that the issue as to when a convict should be considered as a “death row prisoner” must be dealt with in a “humanitarian and compassionate manner”. Referring to an earlier verdict of the apex court, the bench said the law laid down in this regard was quite clear that a prisoner under sentence of death can only mean a prisoner whose capital punishment has become final, conclusive and indefeasible and which cannot be annulled and voided by any judicial or constitutional procedure.

“In other words, a prisoner can be said to be a prisoner on death row when his sentence is beyond judicial scrutiny and would be operative without any intervention from any other authority. Till then, such a prisoner cannot be said to be under a sentence of death in the context of Section 30 of the Prisons Act, 1894,” the bench noted in its order.

“In our opinion, the decisions of this court have quite clearly defined when a prisoner could be said to be on death row and have also taken care of the rights of prisoners on death row as well as those who are a security risk. No further elucidation is necessary,” the court said.

The bench said rights of prisoners, as enunciated by the apex court, should be available in all the states and union territory administrations and they must modify the prison manuals, regulations and rules accordingly. “With regard to the entitlement of a prisoner on death row to have meetings and interviews with his lawyers or members of his immediate family or even mental health professionals, we are of opinion that such meetings and interviews should be permitted,” the bench said. It referred to earlier verdicts delivered by the top court and noted that a death-row convict was entitled to move within the confines of prison like any other convict undergoing rigorous imprisonment.

“However, certain restrictions may be necessary for security reasons, but even then, it would be necessary to comply with natural justice provisions with an entitlement to file an appeal,” the bench noted in its order. On September 25, the apex court had constituted a three-member committee, headed by Justice (retd) Roy, to look into the aspect of jail reforms across India and make recommendations on aspects, including overcrowding in prisons. The court had said the committee would also comprise Inspector General of Police of Bureau of Police Research and Development and Director General (Prisons) of Delhi’s Tihar Jail. The court had passed the order while hearing a matter relating to inhuman conditions in 1,382 prisons across India.

It had earlier taken strong exception to overcrowd of jails across the country and said prisoners also have human rights and cannot be kept like “animals”. The court had earlier passed a slew of directions over unnatural deaths in jails and on prison reforms across India.

Source: https://indianexpress.com/article/india/death-row-convicts-should-be-entitled-to-meet-family-lawyers-sc-5492629/ (Accessed 25 December 2018)

The sons of a woman on death row

Written by Mayura Janwalkar | Pune | Posted: September 1, 2014 12:39 am On a cloudy day in a quiet neighbourhood on Pune’s outskirts, a young man in a puffy jacket and sunglasses rode a red motorcycle on the mushy road leading to his 1BHK rented house. As the 25-year-old, slightly built and shy, dismounted and removed his dark glasses, his three younger stepbrothers waiting inside greeted him. In a house with little furniture except a plastic chair and a table to place a television set, he leant against the wall while the younger ones sat on the floor. “The three of them remember nothing about our mother’s past. They were too young,” he said. Pointing at his youngest brother who is in class IX, he said, “He was only six months old when Mummy was taken to jail. I had to be their mother and father both.” The three younger brothers visit their mother Renuka Shinde and aunt Seema Gavit at Yerwada central prison for 30 minutes every fortnight. A recent change in prison rules, however, no longer permits their elder brother to visit her as his surname doesn’t match. “I have not been able to visit her for seven or eight months,” said the eldest, born of Renuka’s first marriage. The boys know their mother and aunt have been handed the death sentence and that the President has turned down their mercy petition. The half-sisters, set to be the first women to be hanged in the country, have since moved Bombay High Court for commutation citing an inordinate delay in deciding their mercy plea, and the government has told the court that it will not execute them until the matter is disposed of. “I was about 10 years old when we were sent to a children’s remand home in Kolhapur and Mummy, Mavshi (aunt) and Aaji (grandmother) were arrested. That is where we were raised,” said the eldest son.. Renuka and Seema were arrested on November 19, 1996. Along with their mother Anjanabai, since deceased, they were accused of kidnapping 13 children between 1990 and 1996 from various places in Maharashtra, using them to gain sympathy after committing thefts, and later killing many of them. Of nine murders, the sisters and their mother were convicted of five. “I have memories of my mother and my aunt. We all lived together when I was young,” the eldest said. “I am the only one who has read the chargesheet. It’s hard to believe that my mother and aunt could be held guilty of such crimes.” Renuka married Kiran Shinde, her second husband, in 1989. Kiran, who allegedly drove vehicles in which the children were kidnapped, turned approver against the sisters but proceedings against him, too, are pending in Bombay High Court. The boys keep no contact with him. “He never came to visit us at the remand home or anytime after that,” says the second eldest, 22. “A police officer once told me that he lived in Hadapsar. But Hadapsar is such a big town, how were we going to locate him?” While still in a children’s home in Kolhapur, the boys were taken to prison to visit their mother. In 2000, they were moved to a children’s home in Pune’s Shivaji Nagar, which the elder three left after turning 18, followed by the eldest taking custody of the youngest. The eldest brother hopes to graduate in commerce this year through a distance learning course in University of Pune. His marketing job helps cover his rent of Rs 3,500 with scope for savings. His second and third brothers, who studied up to classes IX and X respectively, work as office boys in a builder’s office and live in a one-room-kitchen flat a short distance from their brother’s. “My two elder brothers don’t get along very well. That’s why we live separately,” said the third son, 18. His cellphone started ringing to the tune of Marc Anthony’s Let rain over me. “It’s some English song. I don’t know which one but I like it,” he said. “Our elder brother is very strict,” the second brother said. “He puts all our money in the bank and leaves nothing for us to spend. Whenever I visit Mummy in the jail, I complain to her; she tells me not to fight with him. She worries about all of us. Every time we visit her, she breaks down. My aunt doesn’t talk much.” “My aunt is only seven or eight years older than I am. When all of that happened, I am not sure she even knew what she was doing. She was too young,” said the eldest brother. The second brother added, “Some lawyers had asked us to go to her school in Kothrud and try to get her school-leaving certificate to prove her age but we did not know how to get it.” The brothers rarely step out of Pune and have few friends. “Not too many people ask us about our family. But when they do, we say our mother lives in our village in Kolhapur. Nobody knows she has been in jail so many years,” the third brother said. They had all learnt to cook at the children’s home. “My youngest brother makes the best chapatis and I cook brinjal the best,” said the third. The eldest believes that in a children’s home it is very easy to go down the wrong road, though he adds, “It is entirely upon you. It is what you decide to make of your life. That is why I got my brothers out of there. Now things are all right but if we had our mother to raise us, things would have been different.” He has no elders to find him a bride but he does not believe in arranged marriages. “To register your name and find someone else who has registered is not how marriages should be. I want a partner whom I can tell everything about me and would expect the same from her. I am in no hurry. I leave it to destiny.” Source: http://indianexpress.com/article/india/maharashtra/the-sons-of-a-woman-on-death-row/ [last accessed 06.02.2015]