Punjab and Haryana High Court calls for clarity on foreign prisoners’ phone access

Saurabh Malik

Chandigarh, May 7

Just about a month after the Punjab and Haryana High Court made clear its intent to ring in a new system for enabling foreign nationals lodged in Haryana, Punjab and Chandigarh to telephonically contact their kin, a Division Bench has called for affidavits on the number of such prisoners.

The Bench of Acting Chief Justice Gurmeet Singh Sandhawalia and Justice Lapita Banerji also called for details of foreign nationals, who had completed their sentence. The direction came after the Bench took exception to the payment of call and related charges by the prisoners in the two states.

It observed the aspect would have to be looked into again as the foreign nationals would not have money with them. “Let better affidavits as to the apprehensions expressed by us be filed by the state of Punjab, Haryana and Union Territory, Chandigarh…,” it asserted.

Referring to an affidavit by Haryana Inspector-General of Prisons Jagjit Singh, the Bench observed the position stated was better than Punjab. An audio and video prison inmate calling system had been installed in 20 jails across the state. An MoU was signed in 2022 with a service provider for five years.

The Bench said the affidavit talked about per-minute call rates to be paid by the prisoners. It also talked about written clearance from the Commissioner of Police/SP of the district concerned, rather than the Union of India as proposed by Punjab.

It also took note of another affidavit by Deputy Inspector-General (Prisons) Surinder Singh on Punjab’s behalf. A perusal of the affidavit showed that a communication had been addressed to the Secretary, Punjab Department of Prisons, for approval to provide ISD facility in jails. The case will now come up for further hearing in May last week.