Hyderabad: From complaints about coercing women relatives of prisoners for illegal sexual favours to a mostly empty grievance register, the Telangana prisons department has come a long way in implementing reforms.
In what was an upsetting revelation, director general (prisons) Vinoy Kumar Singh said, “It was found that a large number of low level officials were engaging in sexual acts with women relatives of prisoners in return for arranging a visit or sending a food parcel. It was unacceptable.” Most of such complaints were against constables in sub jails and district jails, he said.
Apart from this there were a lot of complaints about corruption by prison authorities and keeping the tainted image in mind an effort was launched to bring officials on the right track.
Log books are strictly maintained in all jails of Telangana. Complaints at Chanchalguda have gone down from a dozen a month in February to one in June. The authorities have already been directed to submit a report on it.
Speaking about the same Mr Singh said, “Many complaints were received about corruption by prison authorities and strict orders were issued about action to be taken. The department has now been sanitised through suspensions and transfers.”
“There was a lot of indiscipline in the department which has now gone down,” Mr Singh added. However, to prove that the department has indeed been sanitised of corruption a study will soon be taken up.
“We have requested the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai to conduct a survey in any of the 50 jails in TS. Talks are on about this and the survey will be conducted soon. The department has asked the Centre for Good Governance, Hyderabad to help too,” Mr Singh said.
Since January, the department is mostly corruption-free. But, if someone has a complaint they can call 040-24527846 or 040-24511797. Predated complaints will also be taken up, Mr Singh said.
