Tihar Jail: PIL before Delhi High Court alleges toilets without doors, lack of clean drinking water

The Delhi High Court on Monday issued notice to Delhi Government on a public interest litigation (PIL) petition demanding clean drinking water, toilets with doors and better sanitary facilities in Delhi's Tihar Jail [Delhi High Court Legal Committee v Govt of NCT of Delhi]..A division bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Subramonium Prasad remarked that this is a human issue after which the Delhi government counsel, Santosh Tripathi, said that the government will look into the issue.The court noted Tripathi’s submission that the government will take necessary steps to provide these basic facilities and directed him to file a response within six weeks. The case will be heard again on April 14, 2023..The PIL was filed by the Delhi High Court Legal Services Committee (DHCLSC) after it received a letter from an inmate. The jail premises was then inspected by a panel counsel of the DHCLSC and the report prepared noted that jail was lacking in even basic facilities though it houses some of the most dreaded and well-known accused, undertrials and convicts.It was submitted stated that the washrooms and their doors are broken which compromises the ability of the inmates to respond to calls of nature and carry out their daily ablutions in a hygienic and private manner.“Yet further, it was brought out that the living conditions were also poor inter-alia inasmuch as there was also a manhole in the premises which was filled with stagnant water which had begun to spill out of it,” the PIL said.The Court was further told that the Delhi Prison Rules, 2018 and the Model Prison Manual, 2016 say that the prison inmates should be provided access to clean and adequate drinking water and that hygienic sanitary conditions be maintained in the jail premises.“Besides, even in international parlance as also foreign jurisdictions, the access to clean drinking water, proper sanitation facilities, and maintaining an overall hygienic environment in prisons has been made mandatory,” it was contended.