No discrimination against anyone on the basis of religion:Govt tells LS

New Delhi, Dec 2: Government today said it does not discriminate anyone on the basis of religion, caste and creed and deals with criminals according to their crime.

Minister of State for Home Haribhai Parthibhai Chaudhary told Lok Sabha that as per the National Crime Records Bureau data, there were 1,92,202 Hindus, 57,936 Muslims, 12,406 Christians and 4,293 other undertrial prisoners in jails at the end of 2013.

"There is no bias, no discrimination against anyone on the basis of religion or caste. A criminal is a criminal," he said in reply to a question by Asaduddin Owaisi (AIMIM) as to why proportion of Muslim prisoners in jails is more compared to their population ratio. The minister said there were 59,326 Scheduled Caste, 31,581 Scheduled Tribe, 87,848 OBC and 99,748 other undertrial prisoners till the end of last year.

He said till December 2013, the total number of convicted prisoners were 1,29,608 and there were 2,78,503 undertrial prisoners in various jails. Chaudhary said following a directive of the Supreme Court to release the undertrial prisoners who have completed half of their maximum imprisonment period, around 1.3 lakh undertrial prisoners were released from prisons.

"But the problem is even if we release some undertrial prisoners, more undertrial prisoners come to jails," he said. The Minister said all state governments have been requested to take necessary action to comply with the Supreme Court order to release undertrial prisoners after fulfilling the requirement of Section 436A of CrPC.

PTI