Rajasthan, Mar 28: Sanganer Camp is a unique experiment in rehabilitation of prisoners, where they work, build their own homes and live with their families.
At a time when prisoners are escaping from prisons all over the country, Sanganer open camp in Rajasthan stands as an ideal example of ‘open prison’. A prison without high walls and strict surveillance. Only a couple of warders to act as guides and helping hands than as security.
Set-up in the early sixties, Dr. Sampoornanand Sanganer Open Camp is a model prison in Rajasthan based on a rehabilitative approach that relies on family and community. It gives ‘lifers’ some hope after years of being locked up to bring them into the fold as better people. Rajasthan has nine ‘open prison’ farms or camps that accommodate about 400 prisoners, in most areas with their families, but Sanganer has turned out as the most unique and progressive camp in the state.
The town better known for its beautiful handblock printing units, has seen prisoners live in the open camp as they would have lived in their own villages.
They run their small business, work at shops, as traders, as agricultural labourers, run phone booths, talioring units or even teach at local schools.
The Sanganer open camp has been working successfully for over forty years now and prisoners who have done a third of the life sentence and are otherwise eligible to be transferred to open conditions are sent here.
Two-room cottages Their children go to school and they have houses built from their own earnings.
When they leave the camp, these houses are made available to new occupants.
Apart from Sanganer (Jaipur), there are open prison camps or farms at Durgapura (Jaipur), Mandore (Jodhpur), Jaitsar( Sri Ganganagar), Bharatpur, Bicchhwal (Bikaner), Hanumangarh and Alwar also. The camps are without high walls and any strict surveillance and the only boundation the prisoners have to observe is to return to the farm on time for the daily roll call. They move freely within daytime; their guests visit them and some of them are lucky enough to seek parole to attend family functions or weddings in their native places.
Additional Director of Police ( Prisons) in Rajasthan Arun Duggar pointed out that there have been only two escapes, if they can be termed as escapes at all. An inmate at Dr. Sampoornand camp went out to play cards on Diwali and did not return until dark for the daily roll call. In another instance an inmate, who was a psychotic case, reportedly committed suicide.
In Hyderabad The first open jail or jail without walls was opened in Hyderabad in 1954. Spread over about 130 acres on the city’s outskirts in Cherlapalli, the open jail houses 110 prisoners, all undergoing life sentence.
Not only are the prisoners not confined but are trained in useful vocations and contribute in many ways to the society. The open prison earns as much as Rs 14 lakhs yearly from the activities of the prisoners which include running a poultry farm and dairy farm, managing a huge mango orchard and a vegetable farm.
The prisoners work on the farms for eight hours daily in two shifts and are paid Rs 40 daily. While they are allowed to keep half that amount for their expenses, the rest is deposited in banks in their names which is given to them at the time of their release on remission of the sentence.
“The main idea is to enable the prisoners to join mainstream society once they are released,” said M R Ahmed, Deputy Inspector General of Prisons.
Men are transferred to the open jail after serving seven years of life sentence in a regular jail. Once they come here they begin to hope for release on the remission of their sentence for good behaviour. In the last 20 years the Telugu Desam Party government released several lifers in four batches. There are about 70 men today in the open jail who are eagerly looking forward to their release someday.
Sivanarayana of Guntur is one of them. “I want to start a school when I am released,” he said. He is eminently qualified to do that. In the 11 years he has spent in jail he passed his school exam, acquired a master’s in public administration and will complete another master’s in political science next May. “I always wanted to study but couldn’t afford it. I discontinued after ninth class and took up a job as x-ray technician,” he said. However he got involved in a murder and was convicted. He made the best use of the opportunity available in jail to study.
Prisoners may be fleeing closed prisons, rarely anyone escapes from a open camp. They make the best of their stay here.