The Supreme Court docket on Thursday (October 3) struck down a collection of guidelines in a number of state jail manuals which “reinforce caste variations” and goal members of marginalised communities, particularly these dubbed “prison tribes” within the colonial period for violating the elemental rights of the prisoners.
The choice follows a plea filed by journalist Sukanya Shantha, highlighting a collection of guidelines and provisions in jail manuals from states together with Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh. The principles take care of the classification of prisoners and the task of labor primarily based on such classifications.
Based on the 148-page choice authored by Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud, these manuals assigned jail work in ways in which “perpetuate(s) caste-based labour divisions and reinforce social hierarchies”, violating the elemental rights of prisoners.
As an illustration, underneath the Madhya Pradesh Jail Handbook, 1987, prisoners from the ‘Mehtar’ caste — a Scheduled Caste neighborhood — are particularly assigned latrine cleansing work. They’re required to “empty the contents of the small receptacle into giant iron drums and substitute the receptacles within the latrine after having cleansing them” throughout routinely carried out ‘latrine parades’.
Equally, underneath the West Bengal Jail Code Guidelines, 1967, some work is explicitly divided primarily based on caste. Rule 741 coping with ‘Illness in cells’ states, amongst different issues, that “Meals shall be cooked and carried to the cells by prisoner-cooks of appropriate caste, underneath the superintendence of a jail officer”.
The Supreme Court docket has declared all of the provisions and guidelines in query unconstitutional, and directed states and union territories to revise their jail manuals inside three months. It has additionally directed the Centre to make obligatory adjustments to deal with caste discrimination within the Mannequin Jail Handbook 2016 and the draft Mannequin Prisons and Correctional Providers Act, 2023 inside the identical interval.
How do the jail manuals reinforce caste and colonial stereotypes?
The Felony Tribes Act of 1871 allowed the British Raj to declare any neighborhood as a “prison tribe” in the event that they had been deemed “hooked on systematic fee of non-bailable offences”. With this declaration, these tribes had been compelled to settle in designated areas, subjected to fixed checks and the specter of arrest with no warrant, and extra draconian restrictions “primarily based on a stereotype which thought of a number of marginalized communities as born criminals”.
After a number of amendments and iterations, the Act was repealed in 1952 and the previous ‘prison tribes’ grew to become referred to as ‘denotified tribes’. Nonetheless, in response to the apex court docket, “The manuals/guidelines additionally reinforce stereotypes in opposition to denotified tribes” via the classification between recurring and non-habitual criminals.
The court docket makes use of the instance of Madhya Pradesh, the place “any member of a denotified tribe could also be handled as a recurring prison, topic to the discretion of the State Authorities” (Rule 411). It additionally mentions guidelines in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala the place an individual will be designated as a ‘recurring prison’ in the event that they “are by “behavior” a “robber, housebreaker, dacoit, thief or receiver of stolen property”… even when “no earlier conviction has been proved, that he’s by behavior a member of a gang of dacoits, or of thieves or a seller in stolen property”.
The West Bengal Jail Code Guidelines classify prisoners into ‘B’ or ‘A’ courses primarily based on whether or not they’re ‘recurring’ criminals or not respectively.
Upholding the elemental rights of prisoners
The apex court docket detailed how the foundations flagged by Shantha violate a bunch of elementary rights underneath the Structure of India:
RIGHT TO EQUALITY (Article 14): The court docket held that caste can solely be used as a floor for classification “…so long as it’s used to grant advantages to the victims of caste discrimination”. It additionally said that “Segregating prisoners on the premise of caste would reinforce caste variations or animosity that must be prevented on the first place” and that such classification “deprives a few of them of equal alternative to be assessed for his or her correctional wants, and consequently, alternative to reform.”
RIGHT AGAINST DISCRIMINATION (Article 15): The court docket held that the manuals each straight and not directly discriminate in opposition to marginalised communities. “By assigning cleansing and sweeping work to the marginalized castes, whereas permitting the excessive castes to do cooking, the Manuals straight discriminate” it held. Additional, “By assigning particular sorts of work to marginalized castes primarily based on their supposed “customary” roles, the Manuals perpetuate the stereotype that folks from these communities are both incapable of or unfit for extra expert, dignified, or mental work” which the court docket held leads to oblique discrimination.
ABOLITION OF UNTOUCHABILITY (Article 17): The court docket reproduced a collection of guidelines and held that they had been consultant of untouchability being practised in prisons. In Uttar Pradesh, a convict “shall not be referred to as upon to carry out duties of a degrading or menial character until he belongs to a category or neighborhood accustomed to carry out such duties”. To this, the court docket held that “The notion that an occupation is taken into account as “degrading or menial” is a facet of the caste system and untouchability”.
RIGHT TO LIFE WITH DIGNITY (Article 21): The court docket held that the suitable to life with dignity underneath Article 21 “envisages the expansion of particular person character” and “supplies for the suitable to beat caste boundaries as part of the suitable to life of people from marginalized communities”. These guidelines in jail manuals, it held, “prohibit the reformation of prisoners from marginalised communities” and “deprive(s) prisoners from marginalized teams of a way of dignity and the expectation that they need to be handled equally”, violating this proper.
PROHIBITION OF FORCED LABOUR (Article 23): Referring to how work is distributed such that some communities carry out ‘honourable’ work whereas marginalised communities are relegated to ‘undesirable’ work, the court docket held “Imposing labour or work, which is taken into account impure or low-grade, upon the members of marginalized communities quantities to “compelled labour” underneath Article 23”.
