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ShareMumbai: \Asking the state government to revise its circular banning non-vegetarian food in prisons, the Bombay high court on Thursday said, "Make room for everybody's tastes and choices."
A petition filed by six 1993 Mumbai serial blasts convicts had challenged the 2008 ban on non-vegetarian food in prison canteens across the state.
The petitioners -- Sardar Shahvali Khan, Salim Shaikh, Momin Qureshi, Ali Shaikh, Parvez Qureshi and Niyaz Shaikh -- had contended that banning non-veg food in jail was a violation of their fundamental rights. According to them, till 2008, prisoners were allowed to purchase extra food items from the canteen using their own money or the wages they earned in jail.
On the last occasion, justice Bilal Nazki and justice AR Joshi had said the government's approach was "colonial" and had given it three options to amend its decision. The court had said the government should either provide non-vegetarian food once or twice a week or sell it in the canteen or purchase it from outside.
The court has given the government time till September 14 to revise its decision and warned that the court would strike it down otherwise.
Public prosecutor PA Pol said the jail could not have more than one kitchen and exception was made only for foreign prisoners as they do not eat chapatis. Pol said they are provided with bread, butter and eggs. "If you can do it for foreign prisoners, why can't you do it for Indian prisoners?" justice Nazki asked.
Earlier, an affidavit submitted by Ashok Patil, deputy inspector general of prisons, had stated, "The population in prisons is multi-religious and multi-cultural, providing of meat has some times created tension, because of rumours that the meat is either of cow or swine. From this angle, it is very dangerous to provide meat to prisoners."
It had also said that providing non-vegetarian food to convicts serving rigorous imprisonment would make their sentence "soft or simple."
The court observed that the prison officers needed to be trained because at this rate they will never be able to bring about any reforms in the jails.
