New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday voiced concern over prisoners continuing to remain behind bars despite completing their sentences, directing all states and union territories to immediately release such convicts if they are not wanted in any other case.
A bench of Justices B.V. Nagarathna and K.V. Viswanathan issued the order while directing the release of Sukhdev Yadav alias Pehalwan, convicted in the 2002 Nitish Katara murder case. The court noted that Yadav had completed his 20-year sentence in March this year without remission.
The bench ordered the Registry to circulate its ruling to the Home Secretaries of all states and UTs to identify any such prisoners and issue release orders where applicable. A copy will also be sent to the National Legal Services Authority for transmission to state and district legal aid bodies for implementation.
“There cannot be any further incarceration of the appellant from March 9, 2025, onwards. In fact, on March 10, 2025, he ought to have been released,” the bench said.
Yadav had earlier been granted a three-month furlough, having undergone 20 years of uninterrupted imprisonment. Furlough, the court clarified, is a temporary release, not a remission of the sentence.
His plea challenged a November 2024 Delhi High Court order rejecting his request for a three-week furlough. In 2016, the Supreme Court sentenced Vikas Yadav and his cousin Vishal Yadav to 25 years without remission, and co-convict Sukhdev Yadav to 20 years, for kidnapping and murdering Katara over his alleged relationship with Vikas’s sister, Bharti Yadav.
The trial court had held that Katara was killed because Vishal and Vikas disapproved of his relationship with Bharti, citing caste differences. Bharti is the daughter of Uttar Pradesh politician D.P. Yadav.
