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Judgment
Elipe Dharma Rao, J.—The petitioner, claiming to be a Teacher and Secretary in Constitutional Legal Awareness Association, has filed this Writ Petition seeking for a direction to the respondents to take necessary action to release the prisoners, who are detained for a long time without proper procedure of Laws, Supreme Court directions and Human Rights violation, throughout the State of Tamil Nadu on own bails without any surety. The case of the petitioner is that though the accused, by name, Veeraraju @ Velusamy in Crime No. 1527 of 2009 registered for the offences under Sections 294B, 341 and 307 r/w 34 IPC on the file of Polur Police Station, Tiruvannamalai District, applied for bail before the lower Court as well as before the Sessions Court, yet, the same was not considered, which, according to him, is nothing but violation of human rights. It is the further case of the petitioner that there are number of persons, despite the bail granted, confined in various Central Prisons in the State of Tamil Nadu.
Heard the learned counsel appearing for the petitioner and the learned Public Prosecutor representing the respondents and perused the records.
This matter relates to accused, who, inspite of having been granted bail, still languish in jail because of non-furnishing sureties to the satisfaction of the concerned Court. The First Bench of this Court, by order dated 23.12.2011, called for a report from the Director General of Police (Prisons). In compliance of the same, the Additional Director General of Police and Inspector General of Prisons filed a statement to the effect that most of the bail orders by the lower Courts were not forwarded to the Prisons concerned. He also furnished the details of the prisoners who have obtained bail and still in jail for non-furnishing sureties before the Court, which granted bail.
When the matter came up for consideration on 08.01.2013, because of the non-disclosure of complete facts by the respondents - State, this Court directed the Member Secretary, Tamil Nadu State Legal Services Authority, Chennai and all other Member Secretaries of the various Districts, viz., Vellore, Cuddalore, Trichy, Salem, Coimbatore, Madurai, Virudhunagar, Ramanathapuram, Periyakulam, Palayamkottai and Pudukottai, to conduct enquiry in the Prisons located in their area and submit report with regard to the details of the accused, who are kept in jail even after obtaining bail orders for want of furnishing sureties and execution of bail bonds. Accordingly, the Member Secretary filed a report stating that there are about 272 inmates in custody in various prisons in the State for want of providing sureties/executing bail bonds. However, since the report does not contain the details regarding the crime number, nature of offences, etc., this Court directed to submit report containing those particulars.
Thereafter, the Superintendents of various Central Prisons have filed their counter affidavits giving details about the name of the accused, father''s name, Crime Numbers, offences registered and the jurisdictional Courts.
The question with regard to the power of the High Courts to enlarge a person on his own bond without sureties was considered by the Hon''ble Supreme Court in the decision reported in Moti Ram and Others Vs. State of Madhya Pradesh, ). While considering the question whether the Court, under the Code of Criminal Procedure, can enlarge on his own bond without sureties, a person undergoing incarceration for a non-bailable offence either as under-trial or as convict who has appealed or sought special leave, the Hon''ble Supreme Court observed as follows:--
We have explained later that the power of the Supreme Court to enlarge a person during the pendency of a SLP or of an appeal is very wide, as Order 212 Rule 27 of the Supreme Court Rules discloses. In that sense, a consideration of the question as to whether the High Court or the subordinate courts have powers to enlarge a person on his own bond without sureties may not strictly arise. Even so, the guidelines which prevail with the Supreme Court when granting suspension of sentence must, in a broad sense, have relevance to what the Code indicates except where special circumstances for a different course....
The Hon''ble Supreme Court, after analysing Sections 445, 441(2) and (3) and 389(1) of Cr.P.C. proceeded further to observe as follows:--
The court of appeal may release a convict on his own bond without sureties. Surely, it cannot be that an under-trial is worse off than a convict or that the power of the court to release increases when the guilt is established. It is not the court''s status but the applicant''s guilt status that is germane. That a guilty man may claim judicial liberation pro tempore without sureties while an undertrial cannot is a reductio ad absurdem.
In the light of the aforesaid decision, there is no impediment for this Court to enlarge the prisoners who have been granted bail, on executing own bond.
Coming to the prisoners to be released in the case on hand, we have gone through the various counters filed by the Superintendents of Prisons.
From the counter affidavits filed by the Superintendents of various Prisons, it is seen that there are about 163 prisoners languishing in jail even after bail orders have been granted. Out of the above 163 prisoners, considering the gravity of the offence committed, antecedents and the number of cases pending against the individual prisoners, we are inclined to release the following 73 prisoners, whose break-up details and list are given below separately.
List of Prisoners to be released on executing personal bond Central Prison-II, Puzhal, Chennai:
Velu, S/o. Raja
ThangaveL, S/o. Vellai Pandiyan
Thangaraji, S/o. Kaliyan
Siva, S/o. Sankar
Idhayadullah, S/o. Kamal Sheriff
Gnanasekaran, S/o. Kothandan
Raji, S/o. Natarajan
Venkatesh, S/o. Muthu
Eagamabaram, S/o. Chinnamuniyan
Loganathan, S/o. Chandraganesan
Thastgir, S/o. Shek Ali
Muthu @ Vijayan, S/o. Subramani
Sureshkumar, S/o. Arumugam
Jafar @ Zakairhussain, S/o. Babujohn
Muzaffar, S/o. Kaheelk Ahamed
Feroz, S/o. Kalied
Ilanthamilan, S/o. Palanivel
Babu, S/o. Sababathi
Elumalai @ Kuttai, S/o. Murugesan
Selvaraj, S/o. Nagappan
Shaji @ Shajagan, S/o. Yusaf
Kuriyagos, S/o. Bally
Palayam, S/o. Munusamy
Thirumoorthy, S/o. Ramamoorthy
Kandipan, S/o. Kasinathan
Namniath Mohandoss @ Mohandoss, S/o. Appu Naiar
Central Prison, Vellore:
RP No. 632 Sabapathi @ Bagodakathar, S/o. Arunachalam
RP No. 956 Saravanan, S/o. Nagaraj
RP No. 1113 Selvam, S/o. Madurai
RP No. 1141 Ravichandran, S/o. Sarangan
RP No. 1530 Bagiyanathan, S/o. Subramani
RP No. 9405 Moorthy @ Krishna moorthy, S/o. Ramakrishan
Special Prison for Women. Vellore: Rejected
Central Prison. Cuddalore: Rejected
Central Prison, Trichy (RP):
5094 Anandhan, S/o. Anandhan
5466 Chithickraja, S/o. Mohamadu
6445 Khaja Husan, S/o. Syedu Ahamedu
4963 Mohamed Nazar, S/o. Kamarudeen
3705 Chandrasekar, S/o. Rajendhiran
2265 Ibrahim, S/o. Abdulsubari
5435 Gunasekaran @ Guna, S/o. Uthirapathy
302 Thevan, S/o. Subamoopan
3581 Arumugam, S/o. Narayanan
2129 Arumugam, S/o. Ramasamy
651 Punniyamoorthy, S/o. Govindasamy
3577 Sahul Hamedu, S/o. Santhibaba
113 Subramani, S/o. Mahadevan
3810 Govindarasu, S/o. Saminathan
6290 Ramesh, S/o. Kaliyamoorthy
6307 Arunkumar, S/o. Kannan
Special Prison for Women. Trichy:
216 Abi @ Kalaivani, W/o. Sureshkumar
215 Sakiyasaleem @ Sakila, W/o. Saleem
2209 Lakshmi, S/o. Pushparaj
Central Prison. Salem:
FRP Syda Bee, W/o. Muhammed Ali
FRP Shkilabanu, W/o. Karim Ali
RP 82738 Manikandan, S/o. Jambu
RP 83730 Sekar @ Boopathi, S/o. Hahesh
RP 83117 Vinaykumar, S/o. Servesh Kumar
RP 82581 Rathinam, S/o. Veeramuthu
RP 82120 Senthil @ Senthilkumar, S/o. Rajamanickam
Central Prison. Coimbatore:
RP 970 Shenbagavalli, W/o. Velu
Central Prison. Madurai: Rejected
Central Prison. Palayamcottai:
RP 2710 Murugan, S/o. Sudalaikannu
RP 6385 Venkat @ Venkatachalam, S/o. Chokkalingam
RP 7046 Rajasingh, S/o. Antony Raj
RP 5047 Mariappan @ Anai Mariappan, S/o. Subramanian
RP 7620 Subramanian, S/o. Madasamy
RP 2713 Ravi @ Karthikumar, S/o. Govindan @ Selvaraj
Borstal School and District Jail. Pudukkottai:- Rejected
Central Prison. Madurai:
Syed Rasool S/o. Abdul Ajeesh
Seeni Mohamed, S/o. Rowthar
Arjunan, S/o. Govindan
Kuppusamy, S/o. Sadayandi
Pushpavathy, W/o. Mukran @ Babu
Nantheeswari, W/o. Raman
Rakkumuthu, W/o. Anbalagan
The respondents are directed to be release the above 73 prisoners on executing personal bond before the concerned Judicial Magistrates.
The Writ Petition is disposed of accordingly. No costs.