Kareena Eugene
On Monday, 19th April 2021, the Supreme Court took up an issue of grant of temporary leave to convicts who have been sentenced to imprisonment till death while granting interim bail to a convict lodged in the Yamuna Nagar prison in Haryana for eleven years, which are without furlough.
A bench consisting of Justices L. N. Rao and Vineet Saran had granted interim bail to a murder convict, Gaurav Rana, of six weeks. Rana was found guilty of brutally killing a person by firing a round of bullets into the deceased.
The Trial Court had sentenced him to life imprisonment with the Caveat that he would not be released till his death. The Punjab and Haryana High Court upheld that, the order and the appeal against the bail is pending in the Supreme Court.
Rana’s lawyer, Dhruv Gautam said that for the last four years Rana was not permitted to go out of the prison and neither could he apply for remission of his sentence.
Additional Advocate General Alka Agrawal, appearing for the State (Haryana), said that the superintendent of the prison had rejected the furlough application in view of the Trial and High Court order sentencing the convict to imprisonment till his death.
Agrawal also stated that, under the ‘Haryana Good Conduct Prisoners (Temporary Release) Act, 1988’, Rana cannot be released on parole.
