Undertrial prisoners should be produced via video-conferencing: Bombay HC

The Bombay High Court has said undertrial prisoners should be produced before courts via video-conferencing (VC) whenever permissible, as bringing them physically to courts for every hearing was a cumbersome procedure.

Bharati Dangre, presiding over a solitary bench, issued a directive to the Maharashtra government, urging them to allocate the required funds to ensure that all courts are equipped with screens and other video-conferencing facilities. The court order, dated November 10, was released on Friday.

The issue was raised in a bail plea filed by one Tribhuvansing Yadav, who had claimed that his application for bail in the lower court was adjourned on 23 occasions, as he was not produced before the court physically or through video-conferencing.

The bench observed that, according to a report presented by the inspector of prisons and correctional services in September, there are 329 sanctioned video-conferencing units across 39 prisons in Maharashtra, with 291 currently in operational status.

The court, in its order, stated that if the facility is made available to all courts in the state, it may not be necessary to produce the accused persons at various stages of the proceedings. This (producing prisoners physically) is a cumbersome procedure, which consumes time, money and resources,” the high court said.

Inmates should be produced via video-conferencing for reasons such as security concerns, non-availability of police personnel to accompany them to courts and so on, it said. The court noted that to make the facility more effective, screens would be needed in all courts.

It is necessary that every person incarcerated and housed in a prison as an undertrial prisoner must on the allotted date be produced before the court either physically or through video-conferencing, the bench said, adding that the court should also ensure that a video-conferencing link is made available to the prison authorities in advance. It would be better if each court had a designated link so that the procedure is streamlined and the prison authorities are not searching for links at the 11th hour, it said.

It is necessary that every court shall have a dedicated link. If dedicated links are allotted and time slots are scheduled, then production of the accused person before the court can be a simple procedure instead of taking the prisoner physically to court, it held.