Hyderabad: The Human Rights Forum (HRF) has penned a letter to Telangana chief minister A. Revanth Reddy, urging the release of all life convicts who have completed 14 years of sentence as well as those sentenced under Cr.Pc 302, and completed seven years of actual sentence.
As of December 2022, there were 6,114 prisoners (including 263 women prisoners) in 37 prisons in Telangana.
In their letter, HRF appealed to the chief minister to consider declaring amnesty for eligible prisoners in Telangana’s prisons as a gesture of humanity by the new Congress government. “We request the Government to review the issue of the prisoners undergoing substantive sentence with sympathy and release them prematurely. Those who are sentenced under Cr.Pc 302, and completed 7 years actual sentence and 3 years remission period be released,” HRF wrote in the letter.
It pointed out that the previous Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) government released prisoners for good conduct but only twice in ten years, with stringent guidelines and exempting several categories of prisoners.
“The exempted criteria include prisoners’ indiscipline, those who committed offences against women, children, NDPS Act and public servants were some of the categories declared ineligible,” said HRF, adding that such prisoners will be released after completing 18 to 24 years of incarceration.
They also noted that in 2004, “Under the aegis of the then chief minister, Late Y.S. Rajashekar Reddy, the Government released 611 convicts from the prisons of united Andhra Pradesh.”
According to information obtained through RTI, 276 prisoners in Telangana have completed more than 10 years of actual sentence without remissions, including 6 women who have completed 13 years. HRF urged the government to release all life onvicts who have completed 14 years of sentence, including remission, irrespective of the criminal sections under which they were convicted.
