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Maharashtra panel comes down on prisons department over drugs, corruption in jails

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In a searing indictment of the prisons department in Maharashtra, a committee of the state legislature has pointed to glaring lapses in the management of jails in the state, including addictive substances being provided to inmates, corruption in taking criminals to courts and lack of adequate manpower to guard these facilities.

What committee is this?
This assessment was made by the public accounts committee, headed by senior BJP legislator from Pune Girish Bapat, in a report, which was submitted to the state legislature in the recent budget session.

What does the report say?
"The society will not be safe if there are no prisons. The number of criminals in the state is increasing. As criminals from other states are also being kept in Maharashtra, the number of jails we have is falling short."
"The committee expressed its disapproval at addictive substances being provided in jail, the working of informers and them being released on parole."

What does the report propose?
The committee has asked for jammers to be installed to do away with the possibility of mobile phones being used by those lodged there. Expressing disapproval at the fact that CCTVs have not been installed in state prisons, despite the need, the report said, "There is a need for CCTV cameras to be installed to keep an eye on the accused... Even though there are CCTV cameras in some prisons, their number is very less. Due to lack of adequate personnel, there is a precedent regarding inmates being made wardens for managing the internal systems."

On lack of informer network
"Due to lack of an adequate network of informers, an inmate was murdered in the Yerwada jail. If this inmate was not murdered, a lot of information could have been garnered from him," the report said, in what seems to be a reference to the murder of terror accused Kateel Siddiqui by fellow inmates in the prison.

On lack of funds & facilities
The report said if the prisons department lacked adequate funds, these be made available to them immediately. The report added that some new districts, Gondia for example, had no facilities to house prisoners.

On system of recruitment
The report pointed to lapses and delays in the system of recruitment. "Due to recruitment not being done soon, there are murders, (and) fights by prisoners in jails. In such circumstances, when manpower was being made available, why did delays happen?... what action will be taken against those responsible?" it questioned, mooting the need for the department to look at commercially marketing the goods made by prisoners in these facilities.

State stats
Maharashtra has 47 jails, including nine central jails, and work on another is scheduled to begin. This is in addition to 172 sub-jails. In Mumbai, while undertrials are lodged in Arthur Road jail, others are kept in Taloja. Inmates from Nigeria and Somalia top the list of foreigners in prisoners.

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