Hope Behind Bars? An Assessment Of Changes in Provision of Legal Aid For Persons in Custody, 2018 - 2020

This report marks the two-year anniversary of the public release of CHRI’s Hope behind Bars? - Status Report on Legal Aid for Persons in Custody, 2018. This report is an effort to analyse the changes that have been brought in by NALSA and improvements in implementation undertaken by SLSAs to improve access to legal services for persons in custody in India. The information has been sourced from information available from NALSA’s website, its Annual Reports for 2018 and 2019, the India Justice Report 2019 and information received by CHRI from 14 SLSAs in 2019. The report also draws comparisons between the data available now and that from the 2018 Report. These examinations are vital to understand the progress of legal services institutions towards ensuring effective access to legal aid for persons in custody and improving the quality of services provided.