'Will Be Forced To Summon DGP' : Supreme Court Warns State Of Uttar Pradesh Over Non-Compliance Of Orders On Remission

“Some of these prisoners have been in jail for 20 years or 22 years. Then they file a contempt petition. They have to comply with our orders. The next time a matter like this comes to us, we are going to summon the Director-General of Police. Every time, we have said personal appearance has been dispensed with, but the next time, we are going to insist that they come to the court. We do not want to bring officers to the court because they have other important duties in service of the state and the citizens, but if this continues, we will have to summon them.”

A bench of Chief Justice Chandrachud and Justice PS Narasimha was hearing three contempt petitions preferred by prisoners lodged in jails in the state of Uttar Pradesh seeking premature release. Advocate Rishi Malhotra, along with other counsel, represented the petitioners.

While directing for the matter to be listed on Friday, April 28, and for the UP Additional Advocate-General Garima Prasad to be handed a copy of the contempt proceedings, the Chief Justice emphatically urged the state’s law officer to devise some ‘modality’. He added, “Every time I see one of these matters, I think today I will summon the Director General of Police (DGP) to the court.”

“On the one hand, we are staying orders of the Allahabad High Court for summoning officers to this court,” said the Chief Justice, referring to an direction issued yesterday by which the apex court stayed an order of the Allahabad High Court taking into custody two secretaries of the state government over their non-compliance with its directions regarding retired judges’ perks. He added, “We do not want to start doing the same thing.”

CJI Chandrachud exhorted the additional advocate-general to talk to the state police’s director-general and convey the court’s anguish over their non-compliance with its orders. “Please convey our anguish. If they do not set their house in order, we will have to summon them. You talk to them and tell them this. Otherwise, this is no small matter for the Supreme Court bench headed by the Chief Justice of India to summon the Director-General of Police.”

At the beginning of this year, this bench had directed the DGP (Prisons) in the state of Uttar Pradesh to file a personal affidavit outlining the steps taken in pursuance of the top court’s 2022 judgement in Rashidul Jafar, in which a slew of directions were issued regarding remission of prisoners. In this verdict, a bench of Justices Chandrachud (as he was then) and Hima Kohli had directed the district legal services authorities in Uttar Pradesh to take necessary steps in coordination with the jail authorities to ensure that all eligible cases of prisoners entitled for premature release in terms of the applicable policies would be duly considered. The court had also directed that the applications for premature release would be considered expeditiously.

Case Title

Anil v. Rajesh Kumar Singh & Anr. | Contempt Petition No. 778 of 2023 in Writ Petition (Criminal) No. 488/2021 and other connected matters