The Aurangabad bench of the Bombay High Court on Monday said that authorities cannot “arbitrarily lift the prisoners and keep them in ‘Anda cell’ (solitary confinement) without strictly following the prescribed procedure”. The HC added that even if the prisoner is a hardened criminal, there should not be any “inhuman treatment” and authorities cannot act as per their “whims”.
The bench asked the state government to file an affidavit in reply within four weeks to a plea by the wife of convict Imran Shaikh, who was shifted on Friday to regular prison after spending two years in solitary confinement. Shaikh was shifted to a regular cell after the High Court’s intervention in the matter.
The HC said the affidavit should explain the procedure and duration for keeping the prisoners in Anda cell, if records are maintained of the same, and also sought to know how many Anda cells are there in central and district prisons in the region under its area. The Court also sought the record of prisoners kept in such cells for the last two years and duration thereof.
A division bench of Justices VK Jadhav and SC More on Friday had expressed “shock” when a Shaikh’s iwfe Ruheena alleged that her husband’s mental health condition was deteriorating as he had been kept in the central jail’s Anda cell for nearly two years and four months. The jail authorities, on the same day, shifted him to a regular cell.
Ruheena, through advocate Rupesh Jaiswal, who was appointed her “legal-aid” counsel, had alleged that prison authorities were following an “inhuman approach,” despite the statutory norm that solitary confinement for breaking certain prison rules, as per the Prisoners Act, 1894, cannot exceed 14 days.
On Monday, the bench noted that the superintendent of Aurangabad central jail had submitted a compliance report of its direction to immediately shift the inmate.
It also referred to the medical examination report of three expert doctors appointed by the government medical college and hospital, Aurangabad, which noted that the patient is “vitally stable, his diabetes was fairly under control and from a psychiatry point of view no medicine was advised “
The court then perused a report in a sealed envelope filed by the chief judicial magistrate (CJM) who visited the prison, inspected the Anda cell and submitted photographs of the same. The Court allowed the petitioner’s lawyer to inspect the CJM’s report in the registry office and make submissions on the same during the next hearing.
State government lawyer DS Jape, on instructions, submitted that there are Anda cells only in two central prisons in the region, at Aurangabad and Nashik, and they are “high security zones,” where certain prisoners are kept in isolation. He added that no such cells are present in district prisons. After Jape sought time to file an affidavit in reply to the contentions raised in the plea, the bench allowed the same.
The bench orally remarked, “Under the Prisoners Act, you (state government) have to show why the authorities were constrained to put him (Shaikh) in the Anda cell. You cannot just lift the prisoner and keep him in Anda cell without following due procedure… because no record has been brought in that regard as to how long he was there, what was the reason and if certain procedures were followed. It has to be done with strict adherence to prescribed procedure and cannot be done arbitrarily.”
The HC went on to comment, “He maybe or may not be a hardened criminal or creating terror in society, but what is expected is humane treatment and not inhuman treatment. Otherwise his (Shaikh) medical examination report is not that serious, but the same may result in any psychological problem and there may be serious impact if it is left to the whims and fancies of authorities.”
The bench will hear the plea next after a month.
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