Lawyers who have started taking up cases free of cost in the past three months include better-known names like Harshad Nimbalkar, Suresh Chandra Bhosale, Shrikant Shivde and K M Irani in Pune. Advocate Sheila Kunchur, a member of the District Legal Aid Board, is heading the cell that has also started approaching lawyers in Mumbai and Satara to broaden the reach of the programme. ``Seventy per cent of prisoners are undertrials and there is a big lacunae between demand and supply, the result is that so many poor and unrepresented accused keep languishing in prisons,'' says Kavita Kaushik, director, AAH.

Kaushik, who was working with undertrials at Yerawada was denied permission to enter the jail earlier this year, after some prisoners broke jail and fled. ``We have been asking the authorities for a list of the undertrials which would really help us in our work but this is not being done,'' she adds.

As many as ten Pune and Mumbai-based organisations working with undertrials had formed a forum called Action for Justice last year which had requested IG Prisons, T Singarvel, to release a list of the undertrials.

The NGO is now approaching undertrials in the court and giving them the required help. Twenty cases have been taken up so far. ``Most of these people are poor and cannot afford a lawyer. They need legal help that will not squeeze out every bit of their money,'' adds Kunchur. Help is also being sought from India Vision Foundation, an organisation started by Kiran Bedi to protect the rights of undertrials and their children, that is operational in Mumbai.

Though AAH is providing a honorarium of Rs 1000 to each lawyer, which is to include all appearances in court, bail and other matters till the case is going on, Kaushik says she is relying totally upon the finer feelings of the lawyer fraternity.

``We have had a tremendous response and are now in a position to select more competent advocates,'' says Kunchur.

The District Legal Aid Board is meant for providing a lawyer at government cost to the underprivileged, but advocates are provided only if the case is brought to the notice of the court and recommended by the concerned judge. Otherwise, clients have to reach the cell by themselves and often undertrials are not even aware of this existing privilege, says Kunchur.