The author by way of this paper has attempted to argue that disenfranchisement of prisoners often tantamounts to their civil death. In pursuance of the same, the author has attempted to correlate diverse strands of thought such as the principle of universal suffrage, qualifications for voting as well as the comparative poitions in other countries. The author has then attempted to correlate the aforementioned strands of thought to the Indian position and the effect of international instruments on the same in an effort to answer the basic question as to whether prisoner disenfranchisement qualifies as a reasonable restriction to universal suffrage