In overcrowded prisons, justice has lost its way

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court granted bail to five out of the seven accused in one of the most high profile cases related to the 2020 Delhi riots;

- Valay Singh

Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam did not get bail as the Court felt their alleged involvement was prima facie at a greater level.With the apex court's rejection of the defence’s argument of unconscionable delay, and its interpretation of section 43D (5) of the UAPA, the verdict has the potential to have a cascading effect on bail jurisprudence beyond UAPA prisoners. This would put even more pressure on already overcrowded prisons.

In India, four out of five prisoners are undertrials; confined not by conviction, but by the sluggish machinery of justice that turns their right to fair and speedy trial into a fading promise. This is something the apex court said in its Delhi riots order: “The Court does not proceed on the assumption that the entire delay can be laid at the door of the accused, nor does it char-acterise the proceedings as free from institutional or systemic constraints.”