A prisoner is any person who has been deprived of personal liberty against his or her will following conviction of a crime or to prevent the possible commitment of a crime.
Accordingly, the term ‘rights of prisoners’ refers to the nature and extent of the privileges afforded to the individuals kept in custody or confinement against their will because they have been convicted of performing an unlawful act or because there is reasonable apprehension of possible commitment of a crime.
From the above definition a line of demarcation can be drawn between persons who are arrested after the commission of a crime and persons who are arrested on grounds of suspicion that some crime might be committed by the concerned person in future. Punitive detention should be distinguished from preventive detention.
The Constitution of India provides certain basic rights to persons arrested under both punitive as well as preventive detention. In the Indian Constitution, Rights of prisoners falls under the larger ambit of Right to Life And Personal Liberty.
The idea of prisoners’ rights stems
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Lord Macaulay, while presenting a note to the Legislative Council in India on December 21, 1835, for the first time, pointed out the terrible inhumane conditions prevalent in Indian prisons and he termed it as shocking to humanity. Ultimately, Prisons Act of 1894 came into existence which is the current law governing management and administration of prisons. The process of review of prison problems and demand for prisoners’ rights in the country, continued even after the enactment of Prisons Act, 1894. The first ever comprehensive study that was launched on this subject was the appointment of All India Jail Committee (1919-1920). It is a major landmark in the history of prison reforms in India and is appropriately called the corner stone of identification of rights of prisoners in the