HIS death was a certainty. On April4, 1994, Mohammed Tahir, a prisoner on trial in Bihar's Kishanganj subdivisional jail, was set free. In custody, he had faced near-starvation and reeled under an attack of jaundice, both of which he (and the jail) had been ill-equipped to handle. When Tahir's condition worsened, the authorities were left with two options: to continue keeping him in custody and face the flak in the event of his death, or let him go. They opted for the latter. Tahir stepped out a free man, and collapsed a couple of hours later, just yards away from the high walls that had been his home for years: dead.