Supreme Court calls for compliance with SOP to ensure undertrials don't languish in jail after bail

The Supreme Court recently issued a slew of directions to ensure compliance with measures suggested by it to ensure the quick disposal of bail applications and prevent undertrial prisoners from languishing in jail despite the grant of bail [Satender Kumar Antil v. Central Bureau of Investigation and anr]..A Bench of Justices MM Sundresh and Aravind Kumar noted that a large number of undertrial prisoners (UTPs) continue to languish in prison even after getting bail orders because no one is willing to stand as surety for them.Amicus curiae and Senior Advocate Sidharth Luthra flagged the issue to the Court on August 6. "It is indeed a palpable situation which continues to be faced by the UTPs," the Court acknowledged.The Court further observed that a standard operating protocol (SOP) was already framed by it on February 13 this year to address such issues and called for its compliance. "All the High Courts and States/UTs must ensure compliance of the SOP for UTPs as laid down by this court vide order dt.13.02.2024, in those cases where no family member or friend is coming forward to stand as surety or furnish bonds on the behalf of the UTPs," the Court ordered. .The Court was hearing a case kept pending to ensure compliance with a July 2022 judgment (Satender Antil case) wherein it had emphasised on the need to enforce provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) in arrests and trials.The 2022 judgment had called for new bail legislation. Notably, it also said that courts should decide bail applications within two weeks except in cases where the law provides otherwise.The Court today noted that an Institutional Monitoring Mechanism has to be set up to ensure full and complete compliance of not only the directions which have already been passed, but also directions which may be passed by it in future. .To this end, the Supreme Court has now issued the following directions: 1. Every Magistrate and/or Sessions Judge must inform the jurisdictional Principal District Judge about any form of non-compliance of the Antil judgment with a week of the such non-compliance.2. Every Principal District Judge shall in turn maintain a record of such details received from the Magistrates, and forward the same on a monthly basis to the Registrar General of the concerned High Court and to District Superintendent of Police.3. The police shall, in turn, take action against the errant officers expeditiously and inform the concerned Principal District Judge.4. The Registrar General of each High Court upon getting details of non-compliance by district judges shall forward the same to the Committee for “Ensuring the Implementation of the Decisions of the Apex Court” for further action.5. In High Courts where such a committee is not currently in place, the same is to be formed, the top court ordered..The matter will next be taken up on October 15. Senior Advocate Gaurav Agrawal appeared for the National Legal Services Authority, and Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati represented the Union government..In an earlier order passed in this case (March 2023), the top court had ordered that the judgments in Antil and Siddharth v State of Uttar Pradesh should be made part of the curriculum in judicial academies.The Court has also called for all States, Union Territories and central agencies to periodically train and update their officials and prosecutors on complying with these two judgments..[Read order]