Tasaduq Hussain
Srinagar, Dec 07: Dismayed and moved by the double standard towards the jail inmates, a masters in criminal law student has penned his maiden book to highlight the plight of people languishing in prisons facing major challenges in absence of attention and basic facilities.
The author Asif Iqbal Shayeq, belongs to north Kashmir’s Kupwara district who recently completed his LLM (Criminal Law), and is intending to pursue a PhD in law.
The author has completed his maiden book titled “Prison and Prejudice”, which is an attempt to highlight the violation of the rights, high handedness of law enforcing agencies, and the pain and sufferings of jail inmates.
While talking to the news agency—Kashmir News Observer (KNO), the author, Asif Iqbal Shayeq said that during the criminal law course (LLM), he visited several famously known prisons across India and J&K where he found that the inmates detained are deprived of the rights, “even basic facilitates aren’t available in an adequate manner in the prisons.”
“During my visit to jails I learned the inmates aren’t given an equal share of rights and the double standard of law enforcing agencies looking after the prisons also the high-handedness inmates are made to undergo,” he said.
“In the book, it has also been highlighted that the inmates are kept in a grimmest situation with no sanitation and inadequate facilitates, non-maintained toilets,” he said.
“It is a matter of high concern that jail inmates, who are our own people, are made to face immensely challenging conditions within prisons,” he said.
Giving the figures, Shayeq said that at least 83 per cent of the jail inmates have the allegations levelled against them, of which 47 per cent of the inmates are released, “however, only 53 per cent of the inmates are found guilty.”
About the Kashmir valley, Shayeq said that in the book he has mentioned about the three people in Kashmir detained for the Lajpat Nagar bomb blast who were later released after 23 years of serving the imprisonment after the Court pronounced them innocent.
During the research for the project in the LLM course, Shayed said after visiting the number of prisons across India and Kashmir he concluded that whatever is written in the books is confined to pages only and there is no reality in that entirely, “since all that in the academic books isn’t found on the ground anywhere.”
“I witnessed congested jails where nearly 15 inmates have been put in a single jail room. Also, some gang wars happen during which nearly four people die every year who fall prey to attacks in Tihar Jail alone”, he said.
“There are suicide cases in the prisons as well which is a high concern”, he said.
Asif further said the book is evoking a high response from the readers who’ve appreciated the efforts in highlighting the plight of prisoners—(KNO)
