Bombay HC directs govt to implement GR for e-mulaqaats, smart card calling facilities for prisoners across Maharashtra

The Bombay High Court said that petitioner People's Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL) can challenge exclusion of Pakistani prisoners from the facilities in the GR through a separate petition.

The Bombay HC said that it was open for the petitioner to challenge the GR to an extent of exclusion for Pakistani citizens through a separate plea. (File photo)

After the Maharashtra government submitted that it has issued a Government Resolution assuring that e-mulaqaats and smart card calling facilities will be given to prisoners across the state, the Bombay High Court on Wednesday directed the government to implement the provisions in the said resolution.

It said that the prison authorities should provide adequate infrastructure in jails across the state so that the resolution is implemented and all prison inmates are given access to phone calls and e-mulaqaat facilities.

In doing so, the bench disposed of a PIL by the human rights’ body People’s Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL) filed in 2022 seeking immediate installation of telephones and other electronic modes of communication at all prisons so that inmates can speak with their lawyers and relatives via video and voice-calling facilities.

The PIL had claimed that when physical meetings in prisons were discontinued two years ago after the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, prison authorities had provided telephone and video conference facilities to all prisoners irrespective of the offences levelled against them.

The petitioner sought to implement the provisions of telephones and electronic communication as per the Model Prison Manual at all jails and to set aside the abrupt government decision taken in December 2021 to discontinue such services.

On Wednesday, the state government lawyer informed the court that it had issued a resolution on March 23 this year, making various provisions providing phone calls and e-mulaqaat facilities to prisoners, excluding those belonging to Pakistani citizenship.

However, advocate Rebecca Gonsalves, appearing for the PUCL, raised apprehension about the implementation of the facilities and on the infrastructure for the 37,000 prisoners across 60 prisons in Maharashtra. Gonsalves also sought that the decision be strictly implemented across the state.

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“We appreciate the decision of the state government embodied in the said GR. We thus dispose of the petition with direction that the state government shall implement provisions in GR in all prisons across Maharashtra,” the bench noted.

Gonsalves also raised a grievance that exclusion of operation of GR to the prisoners who are Pakistani citizens depriving them of the concerned facilities was “illegal” and violated right of life and personal liberty under Article 21 available to every individual irrespective of his or her citizenship.

The court said that it was open for the petitioner to challenge the GR to an extent of exclusion for Pakistani citizens through a separate plea.

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