Video hearings begin from 3 jails,more in line

For video-conferencing,a separate room has been constructed and equipped with LCD,video-camera and internet in these three jails. The cost of construction of the building,installation of equipment at one jail and its linkage with a court is around Rs 1 crore.

When the number of any case is announced,jail authorities take the undertrial concerned to that room. The counsels and the court interact with the undertrial through cameras and the LCD screen installed in the court room.

A judicial officer in the district court prepares a list of cases for trial through video-conferencing and sends it to the district jail. “Trials through video-conferencing was introduced in Lucknow and Kanpur about 15 days back. About 250 trials have been conducted through video-conferencing in these two jails so far,” said ADG (Prisons),VK Gupta.

Video-conferencing started in the Ghaziabad jail from July 25.

Gupta said the facility would be launched in four other jails of Meerut,Varanasi,Naini and Mirzapur by August 15. “The ultimate target is to link all the 63 district and central jails of the state with different courts through video-conferencing,” Gupta said.

At present,trial through this technology is being done in the afternoon only. When all jails are connected with different courts,video trial would be possible at any time during court hours,said officials.

Officials said the Prisons Department has identified 12 other jails for video-linkage with district courts.