SC stays 7-day jail term to Nagpur jail SP

Nagpur: In a third respite to the Central Jail superintendent Anup Kumre, although a temporary one, the Supreme Court stayed his seven-day imprisonment awarded by the Nagpur bench of Bombay high court on March 16 for contempt of its orders.
A division bench comprising justices Ajay Rastogi and Vikram Nath has asked the HC’s administrative side and the Maharashtra government to file reply by July 29.
The HC here had taken suo motu cognizance of jailer’s wilful disobedience of its binding precedent on as many as 41 counts. A division bench of justices Vinay Deshpande and Amit Borkar had held him guilty for not releasing 35 eligible jail prisoners on emergency parole during the Covid pandemic but allowing leave to six ineligible ones. He was also slapped with a fine of Rs5,000, but granted 10 weeks to approach the apex court.
The SP was convicted on 41 counts for defying the principal seat’s verdict of July 16, 2020, in the case of Milind Patil while deciding emergency parole applications under Rule 19(1)(C)(i) (ii) of Maharashtra Prisons (Mumbai Furlough and Parole). The rule was amended through a notification of May 8, 2020, to avoid overcrowding in the prisons in the wake of the pandemic.
The HC verdict came after Kumre rejected Hanuman Pendam’s application for parole during the pandemic stating that he had earlier jumped it.
The SP through counsel Sudhir Voditel has sought permission from the apex court to explain his stand that out of 41 convicts, only 13 have been wrongly denied emergency parole. For the remaining 28, Kumre has a justification for rejection of their parole.
Regarding release of six convicts alleged to be ineligible for grant of emergency parole on the ground that they have returned late during their earlier two releases, Kumre relied upon the judgment in the case of Bandu Dhanorikar versus jail SP here where HC had held that the convict could be released, as he returned voluntarily without being arrested.
The petitioner pointed out that for the first time the adjudication of applications for emergency parole were given to SPs which were to be decided ‘favorably’ in case of convicts undergoing sentence below seven years and ‘appropriately’ in case of those awarded over seven years.
Kumre contended that it was impossible to decide them without the assistance of subordinates and, therefore, the mistakes committed in not extending benefit of emergency parole to the 13 convicts were not solely his.