Punjab and Haryana High Court rings in new system for foreign nationals to ‘stay connected’ from behind bars

Saurabh Malik

Chandigarh, April 8

Foreign national lodged in jails across Haryana, Punjab and Chandigarh may soon not be out of the coverage area for their families, with the Punjab and Haryana High Court making clear its intent to ring in a new system for them to telephonically contact their kin back home at least once a month.

Dialing up a fresh approach to ensure that the foreign nationals remained within reach of their families, a Division Bench of the high court on Monday initiated suo motu or court on its own motion proceedings in public interest. It followed a request made by a Kenyan national during Acting Chief Justice Gurmeet Singh Sandhawalia’s inspection of a central jail (Women).

Justice Sandhawalia was told during the inspection that system was not in place for the foreign nationals lodged in the jails to get in touch with their family after their arrest. “In such circumstances, we are of the considered opinion that a larger human rights issue arises, which needs to be addressed by both the States of Punjab and Haryana to put in some policy/regulations to ensure that at least once in a month, foreign nationality convicts/under trials are able to get in touch with their family members by way of phone-calls/video-calls which is to be arranged by the jail authorities,” the Bench of Justice Sandhawalia and Justice Lapita Banerji asserted.

In its detailed order, the Bench also placed reliance on a judgment in the case of “Francis Coralie Mullin versus the Administrator, Union Territory of Delhi and others”, wherein a similar issue regarding the foreign nationals and their right to interact with legal advisor and family members came up before the Apex Court.

The Bench, as such, issued notice to the States of Haryana and Punjab, along with the Union Territory of Chandigarh, through the Home Secretary. Haryana Additional Advocate-General Deepak Balyan and his Punjab counterpart Saurav Khurana accepted the notice on behalf of the States during the court proceedings. The matter will now come up before the Bench for further hearing on May 2.