Eyes on Ram Rahim’s jail life now

Aditi Tandon

Advertisement

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 28

With the CBI judge today pronouncing the sentence against Gurmeet Ram Rahim, all eyes are on his post-sentencing conduct and on whether he really undergoes the rigours of his term or becomes just another preferred VIP prisoner.

Ram Rahim’s special treatment post his conviction became a cause of concern with the Haryana Government having to sack its law officer who stood in the convict’s service. Was that the end of favoured treatment for the disgraced leader of Dera Sacha Sauda sect or just its beginning? Political and legal observers say only time will tell.

Congress leader Abhishek Singhvi today said Ram Rahim’s post-sentence conduct will be watched very closely. “We will have to be very vigilant. There is also merit in the demand to relocate Ram Rahim outside the state where he belongs and outside his area of influence. How he spends his jail time will matter,” Singhvi said.

If India’s “VIP prisoner” culture is anything to go by, Rahm Rahim might just manage some comfort in jail with several cases in point to drive home the trend.

In the region itself, former Punjab minister Bibi Jagir Kaur had triggered a controversy when she received special treatment from police and jail officials after being convicted in 2012 for the abduction of her daughter. She was then famously transported to Patiala central jail in an air conditioned car. Later when she arrived in Kapurthala jail to serve her term, she was graciously received by jail officials.

“The Prisons Act and Prisons Manual prescribe clear rules on treatment of convicts. A convict will get no comfort, let alone luxury. It will be a punishable offence if any prisoner is found in the possession of a prohibited article in jail. Prisons manual only provides for some comfort for undertrials depending on their social status and educational qualification. But once an undertrial is convicted and sentenced, all special favours vanish,” says former Punjab DGP AP Bhatnagar.

The manual is, however, brazenly violated as is evident from several cases, the recent one involving AIADMK leader VK Sasikala’s special treatment in Bangalore Central jail. This jail has a history of housing VIP prisoners well. Late former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa convicted in the disproportionate assets case, former Karnataka CM BS Yedyurappa convicted of graft and the influential former Karnataka minister Janardan Reddy were some of its inmates post conviction.

Ram Rahim could qualify as VIP prisoner unless courts keep a close eye, feel experts. Former Additional Solicitor General Indira Jaising says: “The courts have often come down heavily even on doctors and hospitals for issuing fake medical certificates of convicts to help them escape prison stay in favour of hospital admission. It is illegal to give preferential treatment to convicts.”