The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has prepared the ‘Model Prisons Act 2023’ that will replace a British-era law to overhaul the prison administration that will focus on the reformation and rehabilitation of inmates, it said on May 12.
Among the salient features of the model Act are provisions of punishment for prisoners and jail staff for use of prohibited items such as mobile phones in jails, establishment and management of high security jails, open jail (open and semi-open), and provisions for protecting the society from the criminal activities of hardened criminals and habitual offenders. It also contains provisions for providing legal aid to prisoners, parole, furlough and premature release to incentivise good conduct. .
Prisons in the country and ‘persons detained therein’ are a State subject and the existing law in this context, the Prisons Act of 1894 is a pre-independence era Act and is almost 130-years-old, it said.
