High Court seeks info on convicts in jails due to delay in filing appeals
Saurabh Malik
Chandigarh, July 20
A convict in a drug case continued to remain in jail even after virtually completing his 10-year rigorous imprisonment sentence due to delayed filing of an appeal. Expressing shock over the absence of serious efforts in providing him legal assistance for filing the appeal, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has enlarged the scope of the matter before directing the states of Punjab and Haryana, along with UT Chandigarh, to furnish a response on the issue, along with details of other such inmates and steps taken to provide timely legal aid.
The observation
Challenging the order of sentence and conviction is a convict’s legal right and it cannot be taken away or curtailed for any reason whatsoever when the government has provided legal aid counsels to visit jail premises and meet the prisoners
Justice Rajesh Bhardwaj said there might be other prisoners lodged in jails across the two states and Chandigarh “who may not be made aware of their legal right to file appeal by timely challenging their conviction and sentence”.
Justice Bhardwaj said challenging the order of sentence and conviction was a convict’s legal right and it could not be taken away or curtailed for any reason whatsoever when the government had provided legal aid counsels to visit jail premises and meet the prisoners.
The court has sought details as regards the number of convicts lodged in the jails of Haryana and Punjab, who did not timely file appeals in higher courts. Details of their conviction and sentence awarded by the courts were also called for.
Justice Bhardwaj also asked the authorities concerned to specify the steps taken by the jail authorities to apprise the convicts of their legal right to challenge their conviction and sentence and the reasons behind delay in matters where the appeals were filed late through legal aid.
Justice Bhardwaj further asked for details of procedure and time schedule adopted by the jail authorities to provide timely legal aid to the convicts for making them aware of their legal right after their conviction and sentence.
