Kerala High Court Highlights Delayed Release Of Bailed Inmates, Issues Directions To Rectify Discrepancies In E-Prisons Integration

The Kerala High Court has issued a series of time-bound directions to ensure seamless integration across judicial, police, and prison databases.

It highlighted significant discrepancies between the inmate figures reflected on the portal and the actual court orders uploaded, particularly regarding prisoners granted bail but not released, as well as rejected bail applications.

The Court had issued structured, time-bound directions to ensure full operationalisation of the State’s e-Prison portal, following a series of stakeholder deliberations and brainstorming sessions involving the National Informatics Centre (NIC), Prison Department, Police, High Court IT Directorate and the Kerala State Legal Services Authority (KeLSA).

The Division Bench of Justice Raja Vijayaraghavan V and Justice KV Jayakumar has observed, "One of the issues highlighted before us by the learned Standing Counsel appearing for the KeLSA is that KeLSA has undertaken an evaluation of the portal and has found that, as on 29.08.2026, the portal reflects a list of 341 inmates who have been granted bail but have not been released within seven days. However, KeLSA has noted that court orders have been uploaded only in respect of 60 of those inmates. It is further stated that, in respect of inmates who had preferred applications for bail which were rejected, the number reflected in the portal is 113, out of which orders have been uploaded only in respect of 70 inmates. The figures placed before us indicate a substantial gap between the cases reflected in the portal and the corresponding court orders available in the system. Such a discrepancy requires to be examined immediately, since the availability of the court order is essential for monitoring the status of prisoners and for taking appropriate consequential action."

Deputy Solicitor General of India O.M. Shalina appeared for the State of Kerala

The Court was hearing a suo motu writ petition in which it was monitoring the e-Prisons portal.

Previously, the Court had directed the State of Kerala and Home Department to to convene a joint meeting of all the stakeholders, including representatives of the Police Department, the Prison Department, the Kerala State Legal Services Authority (KeLSA), the National Informatics Centre (NIC), and the Information Technology Directorate of the High Court, for the purpose of formulating a comprehensive roadmap for the verification, validation, and updation of the master data relating to the various legislative entries incorporated in the e-Prisons application.

The said meeting will be held on September 3, 2026.

Regarding the issue of creation of additional posts in the Central Prisons and other prisons, the State submitted that the Court had already recorded the request made by the Director General of Prisons for the creation of five additional posts in the Central Prisons and a minimum of two additional posts in the other prisons. This was to facilitate the effective updating of data and for other connected purposes.

Regarding the capturing of the CNR Number in the e-Prisons portal and the integration of the High Court Case Management System (HC CMS) with the iCOPS/e-Prisons application, the Court directed the officers of the iCOPS technical team as well as the IT Directorate to ensure that the entire process is completed within the aforesaid time frame and that the integration is made fully functional within an outer limit of four weeks.

As regards the issue of non-availability of 'released prisoner' or 'out prisoner' data and the consequential overwriting of prisoner status during API synchronisation, the Court also noted that the issue has been resolved by incorporating the details of released prisoners into the existing API.

"This would enable the system to retain the relevant historical information and prevent the status of prisoners from being incorrectly overwritten during subsequent synchronisation", the Court observed.

Regarding the issue of the integration of the CMS and filing modules with the e-Prisons Legal Aid Portal, it was noted that while the necessary APIs were shared, mapping the CMS Party ID alongside the CNR Number was essential to establish a seamless linkage between prison and court records for pending cases.

To prevent delays, the Court observed that the High Court IT Directorate could develop a direct interface for jails to update these details, while proposing that future filings capture the Prisoner ID at inception for permanent tracking.

The Court directed both the National Informatics Centre (NIC) and the High Court IT Directorate to expedite the remaining technical developments.

The NIC was specifically tasked with ensuring the module integrated properly with the KeLSA Legal Aid Portal, particularly for the "Appeal Against Conviction" section. Emphasizing the need to eliminate duplicate data entry across authorities, the High Court ordered the entire integration process to be completed within four weeks.

The Court also directed, "Timely updation of such data is essential for ensuring the seamless flow of information within the e-Prisons system and for avoiding delays at the subsequent stages of the admission and monitoring process. It is therefore for the State Police Chief to issue necessary directions to the concerned police authorities to ensure that the requisite data is updated promptly and that there is no avoidable delay in transmitting the information through the ICJS platform."

Another issue which was brought to the Court's notice was the e-Prisons software is experiencing significant performance issues, particularly while uploading the personal details of inmates, resulting in considerable delays in data entry.

"We therefore expect the NIC to examine these issues on priority and take effective steps to improve the performance and responsiveness of the e-Prisons system, besides ensuring that technical complaints raised by the prison authorities are attended to and resolved within a reasonable time", the Court directed.

The Court also observed that the NIC has to make modifications in the system so as to enable the prison authorities to readily identify and monitor prisoners who have not preferred an appeal against their conviction.

Accordingly, the Court posted the matter for further hearing on September 9, 2026.

Cause Title: Suo Motu v. State of Kerala and Ors. [WP(CRL.) NO. 867 of 2024(S)]

Appearances:

Respondents: Public Prosecutor, Advocate Leo Lukose, Advocate O.M. Shalina (Deputy Solicitor General of India), Advocate Suvin R. Menon (Senior Panel Counsel), Advocate P. Narayanan (Special Government Pleader to Director General of Prosecution & Additional Public Prosecutor), Advocate Sajju S. (Senior Government Pleader), Director General of Prosecution, Kum. S. Krishna

Click here to read/download the Order