Mahatma Gandhi on Prison Reforms
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Consistency in Behaviour The consistency in behaviour and habits are very important for good results. Gandhi writes: “We would be highly inconsistent and hardly self- respecting if, on the one hand, we deliberately break Prison Rules and, in the same breath, complain of punishment and strictness. We may not, for instance, resist and complain of search and, at the same time, conceal prohibited things in our blankets or our clothes. There is nothing in stayagraha that I know whereby we may, under certain circumstances, tell untruths or practise other deception.
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About the Book
Correction of an individual who had committed a crime and send him back to the very same society in one of the prime objectives of the Prison system which is part of the Criminal Justice System of the country. Even after long 65 years of Independence the prisons and correctional system in India have not changed much to achieve the said objective. Because there is not much substantial amendments to the prime legislations in the field, mainly in the Prisons Act 1894 and Probation of Offenders Act 1958.There are daily reports from news papers regarding the human rights violations in various prisons in India. Gandhiji suggested enactment of a new Prisons Act in order to suit the objective of correction. Till then the prison officers will be helpless to change the atmosphere of Prisons as they have to act according to existing law. Prisons needs change in order to prevent thousands of simple offenders becoming hardens due to the treatment received within the prisons. Here the observations and suggestions of Gandhiji on prison conditions and prison reforms becomes relevant as it gives an insight on what is happening within the prison walls and the need and ways of change in a positive way and in the larger interest of the society as each individual has got a dignified existence. It is interesting to find that Mahatma Gandhi fought earnestly by giving petitions, fasting within and out of prisons, whenever violations of human rights had come to his notice relating to him or to other prisoners in the prisons of South Africa or in India.
About the Author
Dr.P .Prathapan He was awarded the Doctoral degree by the Gandhigram Rural Institute (Deemed University), Dindugal, Tamilnadu, India on the topic ‘A diagnostic study of Probation supervision in the four southern states of India trough a Gandhian perspective’. This book is a by product of the research study. He have a post graduate degree in Sociology and a Degree in Law from the University of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram; and post graduate degree in Gandhian Thought from Madurai Kamaraj University, Madurai, Tamilnadu He had worked in different capacities like, Probation officer, Child development Project Officer, Assistant Director, Joint Director and retired as Additional Director, Department of Social Justice, during November 2013. From August 2014 he is working as the Chief Executive Officer of Anganwady Workers and Helpers Welfare Fund Board constituted under the Department of Social Justice, Government of Kerala. Formerly he was a lecturer in probation for three years at the Regional Institute of Correctinal Administration, Vellore, Tamilnadu State. He had published books on Human Rights, Womens Rughts, Child Rights and on Legal Adoption and articles on various subjects. He is also voluntarily facilitating three day experiential workshops on soft skills designed by Alternatives to Violence Project.