The Supreme Court on Friday held that the period of parole granted to convicts during the Covid-19 pandemic to prevent overcrowding in prisons and avoid the risk of spread of infection, cannot be counted as part of their actual sentence period and has to be excluded from it. “All those undertrial prisoners and convicts who were released on emergency parole or interim bail pursuant to the recommendations of the High Powered Committee in compliance with the orders passed by this court have to surrender before the concerned prison authorities within 15 days,” a bench of Justices M R Shah and C T Ravikumar directed while clarifying that they would still be allowed to apply suspension of their sentence before the concerned court. The question of law involved in this case was whether the Covid leave period of a convict’s parole could be considered for calculating the period of his actual sentence. An order passed by the court during Covid-19 in 2020 and a subsequent government notification directed the prisoners to be temporarily released on parole to prevent overcrowding of prisons during the pandemic. The complexity of this question was confounded by the fact that several convicts were undergoing life imprisonment and were eligible to be considered for premature release after completing 14 years of their actual sentence as per the Prisoners Act. During the hearing, the state submitted that there were about 20,000 such prisoners whose cases were similar, some nearing the brink of completing their sentences. Placing reliance on the law laid down in its January 5 ruling on a petition filed by one Rohan Dhungat serving life imprisonment for the offence of murder, the court said that a period of temporary parole has to be excluded from the actual sentence. In Rohan Dhungat’s case, the Apex Court dismissed a challenge to a judgment passed by the Goa Bench of the Bombay High Court on Rule 335 of the Goa Prison Rules and Section 55 of the Prisoners Act 1894 (Extramural custody, control, and employment of prisoners), saying, “If the submission on behalf of the prisoners that the period of parole is to be included while considering 14 years of actual imprisonment is accepted, in that case, any prisoner who may be influential may get the parole for number of times as there is no restrictions and it can be granted number of times and if the submission on behalf of the prisoners is accepted, it may defeat the very object and purpose of actual imprisonment. We are of the firm view that for the purpose of considering actual imprisonment, the period of parole is to be excluded.” Rule 335 of the Goa Prison Rules, 2006 says, that “the period of release on furlough and parole shall be counted as remission of sentence, provided that, in case of breach, it shall not be counted.” Section 55 in The Prisons Act, of 1894 says that “a prisoner, when being taken to or from any prison in which he may be lawfully confined, or whenever he is working outside or is otherwise beyond the limits of any such prison in or under the lawful custody or control of a prison-officer belonging to such prison, shall be deemed to be in prison and shall be subject to all the same incidents as if he were actually in prison.”
