‘Connivance or negligence’? HC flags concern after allegation of phone in jail

Chandigarh: Punjab and Haryana High Court has raised concern over allegations that an undertrial was able to access a mobile phone in jail and called for "serious introspection" by Haryana home department.Justice Sanjay Vashisth made these observations while allowing a bail plea in a narcotics-related case, where the petitioner was accused of being linked to a drug trafficking network.The court was surprised to note that the petitioner, while in jail custody, is alleged to have been in touch with other accused via mobile phone. Questioning how such access could have gone unnoticed by prison authorities, the court remarked that either the allegations were unfounded or there was "connivance or negligence" on the part of jail officials. It emphasized that such lapses, if true, pose a serious threat to public order and institutional integrity.The court urged Haryana home department to undertake "serious introspection" to prevent recurrence of such incidents. "Situations where prisoners manage to engage in unlawful activities within custody are wholly unacceptable and contrary to expectations from the justice system," HC said.The case pertains to an FIR registered at Bhuna police station in Fatehabad under Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act after the seizure of around 500 grams of heroin. Counsel for the petitioner argued that although he is involved in 54 criminal cases, only one conviction is related to drugs and the other cases are not under NDPS Act.Merely because the petitioner is known to police, he has been falsely implicated in the NDPS case to "inflate the number of accused persons for ulterior motives", the counsel alleged, adding that no mobile phone was recovered from the petitioner.Contesting the plea, the state counsel alleged that the petitioner had destroyed the mobile phone. He, however, acknowledged that at the time of his alleged involvement in the case, or even prior, the petitioner was already in judicial custody. After hearing the matter, HC ordered that the petitioner be released on bail.
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