New Delhi, Aug 30 (IANS) To provide relief to terminally ill undertrials, the Delhi High Court Monday asked the Delhi government to examine the possibility of withdrawing criminal proceedings against them.
A division bench of judges Pradeep Nandarajog and Mool Chand Garg asked the additional solicitor general to consider withdrawing the prosecution against a terminally sick undertrial as ‘before trials complete, terminally sick undertrials are dead’.
It also asked the Delhi government to file an affidavit within two months on whether a policy guideline could be formulated for withdrawing the prosecution against such undertrials.
However, in cases where the the terminally sick undertrial is not the only accused, the court has asked the Delhi government to frame guidelines in such a manner that dropping prosecution against a terminally sick accused does not affect the charge against the co-accused.
‘The state government might consider separating the trial of terminally sick undertrials vis-a-vis the co-accused. The reason is that all accused have to be present in court unless exempted, for a trial to proceed and it is noticed that on account of a terminally sick undertrial not being produced in court, the trial against co-accused is prolonged,’ the bench noted.
The court told government counsel A.S. Chandhiok and Meera Bhatia that if the affidavit was not submitted within two months, they must explain the reasons for this.
At present, there are four terminally-ill undertrials in Tihar Jail out of a total 8,463 undertrials.
