From Custody to Care: Evolution of the Indian Prison System and the Reimagining of Prisoners’ Healthcare Rights

Abstract

The Indian prison system dates back to the colonial era brutality that was formalised by the Prisons Act of 1894 defining the hierarchy given to punitive sanctioning and labour extraction over welfare issues. The Act was passed in the wake of the 1857 Revolt and envisioned the jails as a tool of imperial authority which used personal isolation and hard labour to subdue the spirit of dissidents. Places like the Cellular Jail in were an example of dehumanisation in this era where healthcare was reduced to primitive checkups to avoid the loss of working capacity. When the system became independent, that punitive architecture passed down to it, and was incompatible with new democratic ideals. All-India Jail Manual Committee (1957-59) added classification schemes and vocational training schemes, but this was unproductively followed, because of constant strategy of shortage of resources. Reform was brought about by judicial activism in the 1970s and 1980s. Banned restrictions and excesses were eliminated by the ruling of the Supreme Court of Sunil Batra v. Delhi Administration (1978), that stated that prison boundaries would not protect inmates who are excluded by the constitution. A proposal by the Mulla Committee (198083) that an All-India Prison Service be set up and the introduction of open prisons found their way into the Model Prison Manual published in 2016. This handbook combined the goals of rehabilitation, which required the provision of education and counselling. In 2023, the Model Prisons and Correctional Services Act was the culmination of this, replacing the word punishment with the concept of correction and prioritizing after-care, probation, and monitoring by the community, thus allowing press access to create transparency. Operations were also improved by technological changes like the introduction of electronic prisons to capture digital records, thus limiting the time delays in processing bails.