The top court said that convicts who have completed ten years of their life sentence should be extended on bail . The top court sought the assistance of NALSA for the assistance of NALSA .
In her first Constitution Day address on November 26, Justice S K Kaul and Abhay S Oka addressed the justice department in Hindi to highlight the plight of poor tribals in her home state Odisha, besides Jharkhand, saying that they are released after being convicted of serious crimes, but that they are still in detention after a bail order because of a shortage of funds to pay the bail amount or arrange sureties.Each jail authority of the country has to forward the details to NALSA for the development of a national level scheme to assist such prisoners who are languishing in jail despite being released, the bench said in its order.Advocate Gaurav Agrawal, a member of NALSA, was asked to explore all options for a national scheme and suggest solutions to this situation and the execution of the bail orders.Sonadhar, a life convict who has been in detention for 18 years, was pleaded guilty to the charge.
Second, the identification of cases where convicts have completed 14 years of imprisonment, in which case the case will be referred to the government for premature release within a set time frame, irrespective of the state's appeals' pendency.However, legal assistance to do so after the expiry of 14 years seems to have been lacking in many cases, including the present one (of petitioner Sonadhar).We do agree that this aspect needs attention, and that the respondent state, and for that matter other states, must put their houses in order in this regard, the bench said, and sought the assistance of NALSA.