Why in news?
The Delhi High Court recently stayed the practice of deducting 25% salary of prisoners for the victim compensation fund.
How does the compensation mechanism evolve?
- Convicted prisoners get paid for doing work inside the jail, which can be voluntary or part of their punishment.
- These wages are fixed on the basis of their classification as skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled and the rate are revised periodically.
- Remuneration and wages differ from one state to another.
- As per 2015 prison statistics released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) in 2017, Puducherry provided the highest wages.
- It gives Rs 180, Rs 160 and Rs 150 per day to skilled convicts, semi-skilled convicts and unskilled convicts respectively.
- This was followed by Delhi’s Tihar, which gave Rs 171, Rs 138 and Rs 107 respectively.
- In 1998, the Supreme Court in State of Gujarat & Anr vs Gujarat High Court case asked all states to devise a mechanism so that victims of the offence could be compensated.
- Prisons in various states made their own rules, with the amount of compensation varying from state to state.
- Delhi Prisons Rules were amended in 2006 with Rule 39A allowing for 25% of prisoners’ wages to be deducted and deposited in a Victim Welfare Fund.
- In 2008, the CrPC was amended with a new Section 357A, which stipulated that every state should prepare a scheme for compensating crime victims and their dependents.
- Accordingly, the state government notified the Delhi Victims’ Compensation Scheme.
- Even then, the practice of deducting 25% of prisoners’ wages continue to be the practice in Delhi.
What does the court say?
- It was the government’s obligation to set up such a corpus, through which compensation for the victims be provided.
- The director general of prisons of the Delhi government cannot do something which was not permissible under the law.
- Tihar authorities had assumed the power of a convicting court, which imposes fines on a convict, and gone against the Criminal Procedure Code.
- Hence the wages of convicts and prisoners shall not be deducted till the next date of hearing, on February 8, 2019.
- Also, the Delhi government have to file an affidavit about what powers enabled it to take such a decision.
What are the concerns?
- More than Rs 15 crore deposited into the Victim welfare fund from prisoners’ salaries since 2006 has been lying unutilised.
- The rates of wages of prisoners are already on the lower side, compared to the minimum wages that are payable in Delhi.
- A further deduction from the same may not be justified or proper.
- Also, since the Delhi government itself has created a compensation scheme for victims, it seems unreasonable to continue with victim welfare fund.
Source: The Indian Express
