Hello, Mr Convict, How are you feeling Today?

Aditi Datta

While police in Delhi are trying to come to terms with the sensational escape of Sher Singh Rana, prime accused in the Phoolan Devi murder case from the high security, Tihar Jail, in Borsad, Gujarat, the police are still clueless about the whereabouts of the ten undertrials who escaped from the sub jail. Earlier in Chapra, Bihar, more than ten criminals escaped after triggering a blast in the jail premises. Most stunning of all these was the escape of prisoners in Burail, Punjab where three prime accused for the assassination of former Punjab chief minister fled through a 14 feet deep and 100 feet long tunnel apparently dug by them. Notwithstanding the fresh probes looking into the causes, the jails breaks reflects that something is wrong with the existing set-up concerning prisons, prison staff and prison inmates that has been a neglected for ages.

Prisons are places of incarceration and is highly impermeable. The condition of Indian prisons across the country is appalling. Prisoners are a condemned lot and the gross human rights violations within the walls that house them condemns them twice. Outside the public eye, heart or mind there is little sympathy for the vulnerability of prisoners or any understanding of the unimaginable depth of their abuse. All kinds of degradation and oppression await the prisoner, from routine slaps kicks and insults to beatings, sodomy, rape and continuous subjugation by the gangs and dadas that function inside.

If the plight of the inmates are bad, the conditions of prison officers at the lower ranks are hardly better. Poorly paid and neglected as a service, people languish at the same rank for decades and often live in housing that is worse than those of their inmates. Eternally short-staffed, because authorized posts remain unfilled for years, prisons are run on a day to day basis by long term convict warders who then rule the roost and often have more raw power than the 'authorities.' Well connected gangsters belonging to notorious groups and connected to politicians have an easy time of wringing unwarranted concessions out of intimidated staff and no wonder jail breaks are becoming a common phenomena.

According to a data available from the National Human Rights Commission of India, as on June 2002, there were 3,04,893 prisoners in Indian jails out of which 2,25,817 were undertrial prisoners. The sanctioned capacity was 2,32,412 and the prisons were overcrowded by 31.19%. Women accounted for 3.42% of the total population. Even Tihar, the largest jail in South East Asia so frequently showcased as a model jail, has 300% overcrowding. Instead of 4000, it in fact, lodges just over 12,000 souls. Given the state of affairs in Indian prisons, it is but inevitable that the situation has but worsened. Elesewhere in the states, statistics reveal the same picture. In Chhatisgarh, the jails are generally overcrowded. The Durg District Jail for example, houses 546 inmates whereas the total capacity is 396 only. In Rajnandgaon, although there is a separate cell for women prisoners, the women prisoners are either sent to Raipur central jail or district jail in Durg because there are no women warders in Rajnandgaon. At Dongargarh sub jail having a total capacity of 50, this sub-jail lodges 106 prisoners out of which 99 are undertrials! Even though governments are responsive to suggestions, conditions on the whole remain unchanged.

Most of the prison population in India is made up of folks who are not guilty at all but are just undertrials awaiting their day in court. Again most of the undertrials are people who can't pay their bail money or don't have sufficient proof of residence and so cannot assure the court that they will turn up at the next date of hearing. Given the snail's pace at which the prosecution and the courts work, under trials routinely go back and forth from custody to court without effective hearings and months and years go by. Often prisoners cannot attend court because there are not enough police escorts to bring them back and forth from jail. At other times either one or the other lawyer is absent, witnesses are unavailable or the magistrate is himself other wise occupied. Indeed the court itself pays little heed to the fact that a person has come before it time and again and the case has got no further. Women prisoners of course have to bear all this and much worse.

Prisons are a state subject and the day-to-day administration of prisons in all the states and union territories of India are governed by the respective Jail Manuals containing the rules, regulations, orders and the various amendments thereto inserted on a regular basis. One of the solution through which, conditions in the prisons could be improved is by operationalising the 'Board of Visitors' provided in the Jail Manuals and that the recently concluded meeting of the national and state human rights commissions addressed in late January. This is a system through which official visitors such as the district magistrate/Additional District Magistrate/Sub Divisional Magistrate and another official visitor along with two ordinary reputable people from the local community make up a panel of so called non-official visitors. Together they make up the board and have a right to visit jails and observe and report on their conditions. For the past several decades the system has been all but defunct even though it serves the vital function of keeping prison conditions under scrutiny for the government.

The need for a prison visiting system cannot be overemphasized. The new year has already seen five jail breaks, two in Bihar and one each in Punjab, Delhi and Gujarat. It would not be surprising, if we have few more given the fact elections are round the corner. However, at present the prison visiting system barely works. With a little effort it could work very well. It is one way by which to make a beginning to get some relief for prisoners and get some scrutiny of what is happening to their rights. Good people, honest and well reputed with no connection to prisoners or jail authorities appointed, trained and brought together from time to time to give an account of their performance as prison visitors would go a long way to changing the conditions within prison walls. In the past when it functioned well the combination of official and non-official visitors set up a frequent visiting routine, reported regularly on nutrition, housing, medicine, hygiene, and prisoners grievances and followed up with regular meetings to examine what action had been taken to improve the situation. Prison visitors can form a bridge between prisoners and their families and can bring much needed sponsored community services such as eye camps and routine check ups, into prisons. It can convert it from a ghetto to a place where prisoners come out as reformed individuals. It could help in making it a home for correcting people rather than a condemning and convicting one. Inturn, this would take a load off the prison authorities and gives them allies within the local community. The prison manual allows for all this to take place and it is time officials/governments realized its potential.