Sharjeel Imam moves court for PhD material on pendrive after Tihar objects

Justice Narula, addressing the special public prosecutor on behalf of the state, also orally remarked, “It is a small prayer.”

The state did not oppose the request, while adding that it will seek a response from the jail authorities, and can put forth a suggestion to copy the electronic record on the jail’s computer.

Prison authorities had objected to the request before the trial court, citing the “vast” data in the pendrive which would be “hard to censor” by the authorities.

PhD in limbo since 2019

Imam’s research on ‘Cow Slaughter and Communal Conflict in Twentieth Century North India’, approved by Jawaharlal Nehru University in July 2019 when he was admitted to the PhD programme, was to be completed under the supervision of Dr Indivar Kamtekar.

The pen drive contains 248 books, 334 articles, 53 official records such as Census reports, police administration records, and land revenue administration records. It also includes newspaper archives, course guidebooks and lecture series, book reviews and review essays, and three dissertations/theses.

Imam was permitted to access material on a pendrive in April. But before his family could arrange for the research material for his PhD thesis, he claimed, the Superintendent of Prisons of Central Jail No. 1 “was transferred/reassigned”.

He claimed the “new Superintendent of Prisons refused permission” to access the material “without an order of a court of law”.

Imam then moved the trial court in July seeking access to the material.

The deputy superintendent of Central Jail no. 1, however, told the trial court that agreeing to such a request would create an “administrative precedent” for other inmates, and that the data stored in the pen drive is “vast in size which is hard to censor by the Jail authority”.

It also told the court that with Central Jail No. 1 “presently experiencing severe overcrowding, with approximately 2,850 inmates against a sanctioned capacity of 565, strict adherence to jail rules and directions issued by jail staff is essential for maintaining discipline and order”.

Prison authorities had suggested that he can be allowed to access the material as hard copies in the form of books, printouts and photocopies.

The trial court had ultimately ruled that while it “definitely would not have problem to allow the applicant to have access to books etc, but the court would have no control on the material” in the pendrive. It left it to the discretion of the jail authority to consider his request.

Prison authorities have not permitted access to the material in a pendrive so far, according to Imam.