Quantifying compensation for death in prison: HC asks Dispur to respond to queries in four weeks

GUWAHATI: A division bench of the Gauhati High Court has proposed a few questions for consideration of the Assam Government so as to take a policy decision for quantifying compensation to be awarded in cases of unnatural deaths of prisoners incarcerated in prisons.

The high court wanted to know from the state government (i) whether the compensation awarded for the death of an inmate in prison should be in tune with the compensation as proposed under the Victims Compensation Act.

(ii) Whether the compensation should be quantified based on the parameters as provided under the motor accident claim cases?

(iii) Whether individual claims would be required to be filed in cases where compensation is sought for the prisoners meeting unnatural death inside the prison?

The high court granted four weeks for state advocate general D. Saikia to respond.

The issue was raised in a PIL (10/2020) filed by Studio Nilima Collaborative Network for Research and Abantee Dutta, co-founder, with regard to the increasing number of deaths of inmates in prisons. Other issues were also raised with regard to the lack of medical infrastructure in jails.

Earlier, the State Government submitted its affidavit to the high court on May 12, 2023, stating that only in one out of 31 cases of death in custody, a judicial magistrate conducted an inquiry, and only in one case, i.e., Arjun Saharia, the IG (Prisons), Assam granted compensation to the family members.

The petitioners' counsel informed the high court in the earlier hearing that 13 of the 31 incidents (deaths in prisons) took place in Goalpara district jail.

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