Pillows for prison inmates

It is astonishing that it took 230 years for our jail authorities to introduce cotton-pillows for prison inmates. That speaks volume about how dangerously punitive our prison system is. If it takes more than two hundred years for our authorities to provide such a basic necessity in the jail code formulated by the colonialist, how many more years do we have to wait for a humane prison system—which is prerequisite to transforming prisons into correctional facilities?

Prison cells do not always host just nefarious criminals. And, even the most dangerous inmate has a right to have some basic provisions that our jails clearly lack.

In many countries in the world, prison cells are seen as correctional or rehabilitation facilities. Other philosophies about prisons have been proven ineffective or even counterproductive. Only countries like Norway and Sweden that run prison systems in a humane way have been able to maintain a low recidivism rate. Therefore, our ethos and attitudes, regarding why people should be imprisoned, need to change radically.

While introducing pillows for inmates for the first time is a trivial gesture, it represents a change in mindset. So does the newly built central jail in Keraniganj, which was opened in 2016, replacing the overcrowded old one in Nazimuddin Road. Our endeavour should be to make prison cells less punitive and more correctional.