Allow prisoners their daily bath, courts should consider bail for terminally ill undertrials: Calcutta HC
Times of India | 27 July 2024The division bench of justices Joymalya Bagchi and Gaurang Kanth directed prison authorities to ensure adequate washrooms in correctional homes, so that prisoners may be able to take a bath daily. Adequate water supply should also be provided, the bench said.
The PIL that was being heard was filed early this year. It had been alleged in the PIL that numerous women prisoners had been getting pregnant in Bengal's jails - which was questioned by the state govt and even independent NGOs. Calcutta HC chief justice T S Sivagnanam later assigned the bench, headed by Justice Bagchi, to hear the matter, which was based on multiple reports submitted by the state on the condition of prisoners in Bengal.
Justice Bagchi also made a reference to the jail code from 1894, which says: "Prisoners shall only wash their faces and hands but if prisoners are put to exceptional dirty work in hot weather, they may be allowed to have a full bath." "This regulation is from 1894 and right now we are in a completely different domain," Justice Bagchi said, adding, "We should at least not go by these regulations. The West Bengal Correctional Services Act 1992 is one of the better statutory provisions governing rights of prisoners in correctional homes."
