Punjab & Haryana High Court Directs Time-Bound Decision On Beant Singh Assassination Convict's Parole Plea
The Court clarified that Chandigarh UT must decide the parole request after receiving Delhi Jail authorities' recommendation, and directed completion of the process within a fixed timeline.
The Punjab and Haryana High Court has directed the Superintendent of Central Jail No. 15, Mandoli, Delhi, to take a time-bound decision on the parole application of Jagtar Singh Hawara after obtaining comments from the Union Territory of Chandigarh, resolving an administrative impasse over the competent authority to process the parole request.
Hawara is a convict in the 1995 assassination case of former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh. He was sentenced to death by the trial court in 2007, but the Punjab and Haryana High Court commuted the sentence to life imprisonment in 2010. The appeals filed by both Hawara and the State are presently pending before the Supreme Court.
A Division Bench comprising Justice Vinod S. Bhardwaj and Justice Sukhvinder Kaur directed, “…the Superintendent, Central Jail No.15, Mandoli, shall re-direct / forward the request of the petitioner for grant of parole to the Home Secretary, Union Territory, Chandigarh within a period of one week from today; That on receipt of the aforesaid request, the Union Territory, Chandigarh shall submits its comments / recommendations to the Superintendent of the Central Jail No.15, Mandoli within a further period of four weeks, as per law…”.
Senior Advocate Maninder Singh appeared for the petitioner and Senior Advocate J.S. Toor appeared for the respondent.
Hawara had sought four weeks' parole to attend to his 81-year-old mother, who was stated to be suffering from age-related physical and cognitive ailments. He contended that he has remained in custody for nearly 29 years, has never been granted parole or remission, and has maintained good conduct in prison.
According to the petition, although 36 criminal cases had been registered against him over the years, he is presently undergoing sentence only in the Chandigarh blast case, while the remaining cases have either resulted in acquittal, discharge, or completion of sentence.
The controversy arose after Hawara's parole application remained undecided despite directions issued by the Delhi High Court. The Mandoli Jail authorities had forwarded the application to the Punjab Government under the mistaken belief that Punjab was the competent authority because Hawara was an ordinary resident of the State.
Hawara argued that the competent authority was instead the Home Secretary of the Union Territory of Chandigarh, since the conviction arose from a case registered and decided in Chandigarh.
During the hearing, the Union Territory of Chandigarh submitted that under the Punjab Good Conduct Prisoners (Temporary Release) Act, 1962, as applicable to Chandigarh, the authority where the prisoner is lodged is responsible for deciding parole, while Chandigarh's role is confined to furnishing its report.
The Delhi Prison authorities acknowledged that the application had been forwarded to Punjab due to an administrative misunderstanding and undertook to re-route it to the Chandigarh Administration.
The Bench also observed that all authorities whose reports are required must adhere to the timelines fixed by the Court.
Cause Title: Jagtar Singh Hawara v. Union Territory, Chandigarh Administration and others (Neutral Citation: 2026:PHHC:090833-DB)
Appearances:
Petitioner: Maninder Singh, Senior Advocate, Aekta Vats, Jaskaran Sibia, Gursharan Singh Dhaliwal, Advocates.
Respondents: J.S. Toor, Senior Advocate, Adhiraj Toor, Jasbir Singh, Advocate, S.G.K Murty, Senior Law Officer, Delhi Prisons and Saurabh Sharma, Deputy Superintendent, Akashdeep Singh, Advocate, SPP, Advocates.