-Scroll.in They are rarely produced in court and scarcely given legal aid, finds Amnesty International India. On Wednesday, Amnesty International India published a damning report on the state of undertrials in the country. The report, Justice Under Trial: A Study of Pre-trial Detention in India, analysed data available with the National Crime Records Bureau and records collected by the human rights organisation from the country’s 500-odd district and central jails through...

-TheWire.in The State Human Rights Commission stopped short of announcing action against the army, as it lacked jurisdiction. Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir’s State Human Rights Commission on Monday directed the government to pay Rs 10 lakh as compensation to Farooq Ahmad Dar, the man who was strapped to an army jeep and paraded around villages as a human shield in Kashmir’s Budgam district on April 9. In a five-page order, commission chairperson Justice...

-Hindustan Times New Delhi: The country’s human rights watchdog has issued notices to the Madhya Pradesh government and state police for the shooting of eight Islamist prisoners who had escaped from a Bhopal jail. The National Human Rights Commission sent notices the state’s chief secretary, director general of police, director general of prisons & inspector general of prisons for the killing alleged activists of the Students Islamic Movement of India. The men fled...

-The Hindu The ‘Prison Statistics India 2015’ report was released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) on Monday. Here are five things the data tells us about the state of Indian prisons. The problem of overcrowding The report calls overcrowding as “one of the biggest problems faced by prison inmates.” It results in poor hygiene and lack of sleep among other problems. “Keeping in view the human rights of the prisoners, it...

-The Hindu “Fundamental rights and human rights of people, however they may be placed, cannot be ignored only because of their adverse circumstances” Blaming Delhi for paying “little or no attention” to the fundamental rights of under trials and convicts, the Supreme Court said it is “not only tragic but also pathetic” to find that prisons in the national capital, along with half a dozen States across the country, are overcrowded by...