'Appalling': SC slams Maharashtra over 55 non-productions of undertrial, orders inquiry

New Delhi, Dec 3 The Supreme Court has come down heavily on Maharashtra authorities for failing to produce an undertrial prisoner before the court on more than 50 occasions.

After it emerged that an undertrial prisoner had not been produced before the trial court on 55 out of 85 hearings, a bench of Justices Ahsanuddin Amanullah and Prashant Kumar Mishra termed the situation "appalling and shocking".

The Justice Amanullah-led Bench was hearing a plea for bail filed by Shashi alias Shahi Chikna Vivekanand Jurmani, who has been in custody for more than four years in a 2021 attempt-to-murder case registered at Vitthalwadi police station in Thane’s Ulhasnagar.

The petitioner was booked under IPC Sections 143, 147, 148, 149, 307, 326, 353, and 333. The petitioner’s lawyer argued that the initial FIR alleged stabbing, but subsequent statements clarified that the petitioner had only assaulted with fists and kicks. I

In the statement recorded by a police constable before his death, the victim attributed the knife attack to a different co-accused.

While granting bail to the petitioner, the bench noted that co-accused, Umesh @ Omi Bansilal Kishnani, who was said to be “identically situated,” had already been granted bail.

However, the failure of the authorities to produce the petitioner before the trial court alarmed the Supreme Court.

"We are shocked at the conduct of the state authorities," the bench said, adding that production of an accused is not merely a procedural formality but a "safeguard so that the prisoner is not abused otherwise" and to air his grievances before the trial court, if any, against the authorities.

Calling it a "grave infraction of such fundamental safeguard, which is appalling and shocking", the apex court issued stringent directions to the Maharashtra Prisons Department. It ordered the Director General of Prisons, or the head of the prisons department, to personally conduct an inquiry, fix responsibility, and take action against those responsible for the repeated non-production.

The bench cautioned that any attempt to shield errant officials would result in personal liability for the DG Prisons. "If any attempt is made to protect or shield any person, the Director General of Prisons/Head of Department of Prisons to whom we are entrusting the inquiry, shall be personally held responsible for the same," the order warned.

It further directed the submission of a personally affirmed affidavit along with a detailed report within two months, when the matter is tentatively scheduled to be taken up again on February 3, 2026.

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