Assam jails in deplorable condition, says NHRC

GUWAHATI, July 22: Despite the strict guidelines laid down by the National Human Rights Commission, most of the jails in Assam are in a deplorable condition. The jail inmates are compelled to spend their days in unhygienic condition as most of the district jails neither have proper maintenance nor funds to repair old constructions. One of the oldest jails in the country in Lower Assam's Dhubri district is facing the perennial waterlogging problem. Disclosing this to The Asian Age on Monday, the special representative of the commission in the Northeast, SB Medhi, said that two persons serving life imprisonment in Jorhat district jail have completely lost their mental balance and despite their illness, both are languishing in a jail cell. Regretting the conditions of the jail inmates in Assam, Medhi said that main problem is lack of training and orientation of the jail authorities on the human rights. Most of jails do not have a vehicle to produce the jail inmates in the court and they rely on district administration. There are many instances when jail inmates are not produced in the court on their respective hearing dates, he said. Medhi also pointed out that buildings of the Jorhat district jail has not been white-washed since last 10 years. The area being earthquake prone, the old buildings of the jail are vulnerable, he added. Assam's only open-air Mahendra Nagar jail at Jorhat is also badly maintained and encroachment on its land is posing serious threat to the security. Two convicts taking the advantage of encroachment in and around the jail premises escaped and are yet to be traced. Another major problem afflicting the jails in Assam is that habitual and non-habitual convicts and undertrials are kept together, he said. Interestingly, Medhi's report is just opposite to the one by the chief judicial magistrate who has been directed by the Supreme Court to visit the respective district jails frequently to monitor the condition of the jail inmates. Medhi, who visited three district jails in Assam at the directive of the NHRC, has requested the NHRC to arrange training of the jail authorities at the earliest so that they could be sensitised towards the rights of the jail inmates. He, however, refused to react to the report of the chief judicial magistrates of the respective districts that failed to point out the hardship of the jail inmates. Medhi said that he was also given the reports of the CJMs by the jail authorities obviously to strengthen their position. Medhi said that a large number of ULFA and Bodo militants are also languishing in Assam jails but the state administration has failed to take any initiative to provide some training and orientation to these youths to desert the path of violence. Although, Medhi in his report has also pointed out that state administration has so far failed to announce the service rule of the jail employees that also affect the working of the jail authorities who subsequently loses interest in improving their performance.