PEOPLES WATCH Vs. HOME SECRETARY HOME DEPARTMENT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) "No one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails.

(2.) The petitioner, a Human Rights Organisation based at Madurai, represented by its Executive Director, has filed this writ petition seeking to issue a Writ of Mandamus directing the respondents to appoint trained and skilled non-official visitors to the Board of Visitors to Jails as per Rule 507 of the Tamil Nadu Prison Rules, 1983 for visiting each of the Central Jails and Sub Jails to address the grievance of prisoners and helping the prison administration and also to incorporate the directions issued by the Joint Secretary of Home Department to the Government of India vide proceedings in F.No.16014/4/2005-PR dtd. 18/2/2011 and Chapter 29 of the Model Prison Manual, 2003 within a time that may be stipulated by this Court.

(3.) (i) According to the petitioner, prisons in our State still remain closed institutions and its physical structure and rules endow them with a cover of obscurity in which fundamental human rights can be unofficially violated and officially denied. It is stated that over the years, prisons have become places of low visibility, where inhuman and even cruel conditions of prisoners continue to prevail. There are adequate possibilities where the inmates are inflicted with injuries and in order to prevent such situations, the Prisons Act, 1894 (hereinafter shortly referred to as "Act") was enacted. The petitioner referring to Sec. 59 (25) of the Act which deals with appointment and guidance of visitors of prison, stated that such right to visit the prisoner is a mechanism provided where people from the outside community are appointed by governments to enter the prison and assess the human rights situation prevailing there. He also referred to Rule 507 of the Tamil Nadu Prison Rules, 1983, which provides for the appointment of non-official visitors to ensure continuous monitoring of the conditions inside all prisons/jails, particularly, the manner in which human rights of prisoners are safeguarded. The petitioner also furnished the statistics of the number of prisons and the capacity of each prison to accommodate the prisoners in para No.5 of the affidavit.