The Sentence Review Board (SRB) is an institution constituted by State Governments and Union Territories to review the sentences of prisoners and recommend their premature release in appropriate cases. The SRB was conceived to eliminate disparity and inconsistency in the premature release of prisoners. The idea was first suggested by the Mulla Committee and later reinforced by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), which published revised guidelines in 1999 for states to implement.
The SRB functions as a permanent body, typically comprising senior state officials such as the Chief Secretary, Director General of Prisons, and Police Commissioner. It examines a life convict's case based on factors like their overall conduct in jail, the possibility of their rehabilitation, and the socio-economic condition of their family. The SRB's recommendation is then forwarded to the State Government, which takes the final decision.
The SRB's work is intrinsically linked to the executive's power of remission and commutation, which is derived from the constitutional clemency powers of the President (Article 72) and the Governor (Article 161). Statutorily, this power was previously governed by Sections 432 and 433 of the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 (CrPC). A key provision, Section 433-A of the CrPC, mandated a minimum of 14 years of actual imprisonment for life convicts in certain serious offences before they could be considered for release.
The legal framework has recently been updated: the CrPC provisions are now replaced by the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS). The state government's power to grant remission is now vested under Sections 473 and 474 of the BNSS. Furthermore, Section 475 of the BNSS makes the 14-year actual imprisonment threshold mandatory for offences where the death penalty was an option. In 2025, the Supreme Court clarified in Sukhdev Yadav that the SRB cannot override a judicially fixed sentence, holding that further executive approval is not required once the prescribed term is completed.