Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala has said that the government is taking steps to release life convicts in various prisons in the State in the wake of the Supreme Court’s direction. Mr. Chennithala said the government would release life convicts who had completed 10 years of jail term on August 15 as per the norms set by the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court on Thursday had restored State governments’ discretion to free life convicts. The prisons in the State could accommodate as many as 6,217 convicts. But 6,965 convicts, including 1,377 life convicts, were languishing in State’s jails at present, the Minister said.
Though the government had decided last year to release life convicts on humanitarian grounds, it was frozen after a directive from the Supreme Court, Mr. Chennithala said, adding that he had directed Secretary of Home Affairs to expedite measures to collect the details of the convicts and submit them to the Cabinet.
Measures had been intensified to fill the sanctioned posts of jail wardens in prisons of the State, he said.
SC restores States’ discretion to free life convicts
State has been able to contain Maoist terror: Chennithala
1,377 life convicts languishing in State’s jails
