topics: |  india | prison |

	Dear Arun:

	I read your book in one intense sitting, reeling in shock from the
	blatant excesses of our "law enforcement" system.

	Please post updates on your blog about the court case you had filed
	against violation of your rights.  Maybe I am naive, but I think this
	can be an important landmark for civil rights in India.

	We are with you on this. 

	Amitabha Mukerjee
	IIT Kanpur

This book written in clear impersonal factual language, describes the five-year period that Arun Ferreira spent in jail, as an undertrial in eleven cases. In every one of them, there was no evidence whatsoever to connect him to the serious charges.

The book was shortlisted for the Crossword Non-Fiction prize, 2014.

The case(s) of Arun Ferreira

Arrested in May 2007, Ferreira was charged in one case after another - eleven in all - so that he could continue to be held in Police Custody (PCR) for interrogation.

Ostensibly, he was charged with naxalite violence. The media dubbed him a naxal leader - the maoist from Bandra. But one after the other, when the cases came up for hearing, there were no substantive witnesses, no links between Ferreira and the farflung crimes.

The question the book raises, without hinting at it even, is - who is responsible for the loss of liberty for Arun and thousands others like him? What can we do to clean up our legal process?

When the cases went to trial, the prosecution (police) kept delaying the hearings - witnesses would not be served notices - the "bandobast" for taking such high-security prisoners would not come through, new accused would be added to cases, so that evidence-taking would need to re-start afresh, etc. in addition, judges would be on vacation, dates would fall far apart, etc.

In the end however,, most of the witnesses, it seems, had been assigned concocted depositions, and one after the other, would recant when in the witness stand.

Thus, even if a case has no merit whatsoever, it took many years to get disposed of.

Surprisingly, the media was no wiser. Ferreira had been a social activist since his college days, working for the dalits, the landless, and other weaker sections. After Babri Masjid, they also organized the thousands of muslims who were systematically looted by Shiv Sena mobs. Subsequently, he joined several leftist organizations working at the state level.

In 1995, they worked for the ouster of the corrupt Bombay U pro-VC
S.D. Karnik.
[Following numerous complaints of corruption and malpractice, pro-VC
Dr. S.D. Karnik, said to be close to the Shiv Sena, was dismissed without
charges in 2002.  Thereafter he was appointed chairman of the Maharashtra
Public Services Commission, and was eventually arrested by the
Anti-Corruption Bureau for large-scale corruption.]

Given Ferreira's activist background, the newspapers believed the story
of his naxalite links, reporting his arrest in the language of the charges,
calling him a "Naxal leader" "Maoist head of communications" etc.:
  * Outlook: "Naxal Leader Arun Ferreira Released": (also DNA, ToI, etc.)
  * Rediff : "Maoist leader Arun Ferreira rearrested":
	Ferriera along with three other Maoists leaders were picked up the
	city police in a swift operation from Deekshabhoomi here on May 8,
	2007 for their active involvement in strengthening the Naxalite
	network.     
	    Ferriera is believed to be the head of the communication and
	propaganda cell of CPI (M). [This after his 2011 re-arrest]

Ferreira, according to the police, operated under several aliases — Sanjay
Chaudhary, Shukla among them. 

Owing to the heinous nature of the Naxalite crimes cited, Ferreira was also
refused bail except at the end when the manner of his re-arrest ignited
civil society protests.

List of Cases - dates of filing and acquittal

A [may '07]. Maoist Conspiracy (to blowup Deekshabhoomi complex, where
	Ambedkar had converted to Buddhism). [acquitted dec 2009]
B [may '07]. Blasting of a police van near Bevartola dam, Gondia 
	[acquitted aug 2010]
C [jun '07]. Murder of two youth at Ganutola, Gondia [Acquit feb 11]
D-F [jun '07]. Three cases.  Firing on police parties, arms possession
	etc. [Acquitted: Jun '09, Jul '10, Jan '11]
G [oct '07]. Burning a rail engine at Toya Gondi, Gondia.  [Acquit aug 10]
H [jan '08]. Sedition / Conspiracy together w Deshbhakti Yuva Manch,
	Chandrapur [Acq sep 11]
I [jul '08]. attempt to suicide following organizing hunger strike in prison
	[discharged without trial (based on own arguments) 20 Jul 09]
J [sep '11]. firing on police party in Zhendepar village, Gadichiroli. 
	[This was the cruellest cut.  In 2011, after nearly four years, he
	had been acquitted in all cases A-I.  The day before, he had a
	mulAkAt with his lawyers and family, and plans were made for
	celebrations on release.  upon being set out from the "lAl gate", he
	is abducted by plainclothes policemen and his waiting relatives never
	get to see him.  he is then re-arrested on fresh unrelated charges.
	the re-arrest results in a media hue and cry, and trial is hastened.
	[Acquitted Dec 2011]
K [sep '11]. Firing on police party in Jafragarh Hills, Gadchiroli.  
  	[only case in which he got bail, Jan 2012; Acquitted Jan 14]

		[All 11 cases were dismissed due to no evidence.]

Police impunity

Reading his story one despairs about India's criminal justice system, for it
seems as if none of the cases had any merit whatsoever.  It seems that any
police officer can at whim concoct a series of charges, and if these seem
serious enough, you may be locked away for years while disentangling the
charges.  This is especially true for poor litigants - e.g. tribals charged
of naxal crimes - who are often unable to come up with bail even if granted,
or who work with government legal aid officers, who did not have the time to
even track the many cases in which they had been named. 

More than despair, one is angry.  Who are the police decision-makers who
decided to abduct Ferreira after his release in September 2011?  What can
be done in a democratic setup to bring these police criminals to book?

The majority of prisoners are undertrial prisoners - nearly 75% of all
prisoners - or over 3 lakh individuals. 
[also see: Undertrial prisoners and the criminal justice system, 
Madhurima, CHRI

And is no one culpable for making such inane baseless charges and ruining
the life of a man for five years?  (the case filed by Ferreira
is worth following-up on).

What is impressive about the writing though is that there is no trace of
anger.  It is a story told directly, with a minimum of emotion.   This is
perhaps what makes the story even more effective. 

Also, unlikely in a story of this nature, the narrative retains its
suspense, and you turn the pages, from missing judges to lost dates to
bungled hearings and  hoping for the courts to eventually come through.  

Nonetheless, I sat up and finished the book in one sitting, rather unusual
for a book of this type!

Indian prison life

The book's primary focus, however, is on the mechanics of prison life.
There are two types of prisoners :
* kaydi : convicted prisoners
* haulat : undertrial.  are supposed to be "innocent until proven guilty"
	- but all such distinctions are lost in prison. 

Throughout his five year stay, Ferreira was an haulat - an undertrial.  But
his experience was no different from that of a convict.  Once the police
suspect you, you are a prisoner under law.

	
	ferreira is a talented graphic artist, and the book samples
	five of his sketches as chapter headings.  but it would
	be nice to see the full set of 40-odd images of prison life
	that he he mentions having sketched for internal
	entertainment.  

I have attached some of his other sketches at appropriate points below. 

 

Excerpts

The 'anda' barracks are a cluster of windowless cells within the
high-security confines of Nagpur Central Jail.  To get to most cells from
the anda entrance, you have to pass through five heavy iron gates, [and] a
maze of narrow corridors and pathways.

There are several distinct compounds within the anda, each with a few
cells, each cell carefully isolated.  There’s little light in the cells and
you can’t see any trees. You can’t even see the sky.

There is a watchtower in the centre of the anda, and from the top, the yard
must resemble an enormous, airtight concrete egg. But there’s a vital
difference. It’s impossible to break it open. Rather, it’s designed to make
inmates crack. p.2

The anda is where the most unruly prisoners are confined, as punishment for
violating disciplinary rules. The other parts of Nagpur jail aren’t quite
so severe. Most prisoners are housed in barracks, with fans and a TV. In
the barracks, the day-time hours can be quite relaxed, even
comfortable. But in the anda, the only ventilation is provided by the gate
of your cell, and even that doesn’t afford much comfort because it opens
into a covered corridor, not an open yard.

 
the desolation of the anda cell ... [sketch by ferreira]

But more than the brutal, claustrophobic aesthetic of the anda, it’s the
absence of human contact that chokes you. If you’re in the anda, you spend
15 hours or more alone in your cell. The only people you see are the guards
and occasionally the other inmates in your section. A few weeks in the anda
can cause a breakdown. The horrors of the anda are well-known to prisoners
in Nagpur jail, and they would rather face the severest of beatings than be
banished to the anda.

But I wasn't an ordinary prisoner. I was a ‘dreaded Naxalite’, a ‘Maoist
leader’: descriptions that appeared in newspapers the morning after I was
arrested on 8 May 2007.

[a look at the headlines show that these descriptions persisted for years] 

While most prisoners spend only a few weeks in the anda or in its cousin,
the phasi yard -- home to prisoners sentenced to death -- these were the
sections in which I would spend the entire four years and eight months of
my stay at Nagpur jail.

The arrest : 8 May 2007

It was a typical hot Nagpur summer afternoon when I was arrested at the
railway station. I was waiting to meet some social activists when around
fifteen men surrounded me. Some of them bundled me into a car which drove
away at high speed. I was kicked and punched by them all the while. After
five minutes, the car halted and I was carried to a room on the first floor
of a building, which my abductors later told me was the Nagpur Police
Gymkhana. p.3

[It is interesting that this building dates from colonial times.  Clearly,
the tradition of torture at the police HQ also must be continuing from
British times, possibly in the very same rooms...  However, AF does not
remark on this.]

From their conversations, it became evident that I had been detained by the
Anti-Naxal Cell of the Nagpur police. They tied my hands with my belt and I
was blindfolded, so that the officials involved in this operation would
remain unidentified.

‘Maar dalo saale ko. Encounter mein usse khatam karo’, they yelled,
threatening to kill me in an ‘encounter’, or an extra-judicial execution, a
bluff police routinely use to scare people they’ve detained. p.4

Through the day, I was flogged with belts, kicked and slapped, as they
attempted to soften me up for the interrogations that were to follow…

I was afraid they’d kill me. Thus far, there was nothing official about my
detention. They hadn’t shown me a warrant, nor had I been taken to a police
station. I feared that the police could murder me and pretend that I’d been
killed in an encounter. I’d read about many situations in which the police
claimed to have had no option but to open fire when suspects they were
attempting to arrest had resisted. I knew that the National Human Rights
Commission had noted thirty-one cases of fake encounter killings in
Maharashtra alone in the previous five years. The physical torture, though
painful, was relatively tame compared to this prospect.

At midnight, eleven hours after I had been detained, I was taken to a police
station and informed that I had been arrested under the Unlawful Activities
(Prevention) Act, 2004, [successor to POTA] which is applied to people the
state brands as terrorists.  I spent that night in a damp cell in the
station house.  My bedding was a foul-smelling black blanket.  A hole in
the ground served as a urinal.

I was finally served a meal: dal, rotis and abuse.  It wasn't easy to eat
from a plastic bag with jaws sore from blows... 

Within a few hours, I was woken up for another round of questioning. The
officers appeared polite at first but quickly resorted to blows in an attempt
to encourage me to provide the answers they were looking for. They wanted me
to disclose the location of a cache of arms and explosives or information
about my supposed links with Maoists. 

Torture: Body stretching (drawing) and sole beating (bastinado)

To make me more amenable to their demands, they stretched out my body
completely, using an updated version of the medieval torture technique of
drawing (though there was no quartering). My arms were tied to a window
grille high above the ground while two policemen stood on my outsretched
thighs to keep me pinned to the floor. This was calculated to cause maximum
pain without leaving visible injuries. 

Despite these precautions, my ears started to bleed and my jaws began to
swell. In the evening I was forced to squat on the floor with a black hood
over my head as a posse of officers posed behind me for press
photographs. The next day, I would later learn, these images made the front
pages of newspapers around the country. The press was told that I was the
chief of communications and propaganda of the Maoist Party.

[Later, he has trouble convincing his family also that he hadn't been
involved in these Naxal activities.]

Torture: cover-up before the magistrate

[Another common form of torture is the Bastinado, called "bajirao" in the
local lingo.  After torture, he is bleeding and evidently bashed up.]

I was then produced before a magistrate. As all law students know, 
this step has been introduced [to the legal process] to give 
detainees an opportunity to complain against custodial 
torture—something I could establish quite easily since my face was 
swollen, ears bleeding and soles so sore it was impossible to 
walk. But in court, I learnt from my lawyers that the police had 
already accounted for those injuries in their concocted arrest 
story. According to their version, I was a dangerous terrorist and 
had fought hard with police to try to avoid arrest. They claimed that 
they had no option but to use force to subdue me. Strangely, none of 
my captors claimed to have been harmed during the scuffle. p.6 

--Police Custodial Remand (PCR) = Torture-- 
Back at the Gymkhana, they repeatedly attempted to force us to sign 
a statement they had drafted confessing to our involvement with the Maoists.  
Through most of the interrogation sessions, I would have to squat on the
ground with my hands handcuffed behind my back.  After a few hours, I'd
slump forward because I was so tired.  p.9

taaba = custody 
"PCR" = Police Custodial Remand 

PCR is used as a threat "Uska pee-cee-aar kiya." "Hum tera pee-cee-aar kara
denge."

After arrest, suspects are to be produced before a magistrate within 24
hours.  The magistrate then takes cognisance of the offence and formalizes
the detention. But as in my case, the police often circumvent the 24-hour
limitation by claiming to have arrested me later than they actually did. 49

During pee-cee-aar, when one is lodged in a police lock-up, one's
constitutionally guaranteed rights are always under threat.  The right to
silence, for one, is guaranteed in the Indian constitution Article 20(3).
However, every time I - perhaps naively -- sought refuge in this
fundamental right, it would only entail more torture. 11

Filing more cases : used as a method to continue holding in PCR. 
Five more cases filed between 28 May and 14 June. p.23

By the end of each PCR, chargesheets would need to be filed.  These were
bulky documents listing the charges along with evidence and witness
statements.  [Later many of these witnesses would disagree with what was
concocted in the chargesheets, hence they would become "hostile" witnesses.]

Torture by petrol

During this round of pee-cee-aar, in the police station at Amgaon (interior
of Gondia), the other co-accused with him were subjected 
to a new torture. 

The sub-divisional police officer, a man named Korate, injected petrol into
the rectum of two of my co-accused.  A couple of staff lifted their legs
while an inspector infiltratred 20ml of petrol into their bodies.  The
vapours of gasoline burned the intestine linings, which resulted in
agonizing days of anal bleeding, blood glots, and continuous belching.

I wonder how Korate knew that exactly 20ml of petrol would cause such
enormous pain yet not kill.  Clearly the police had been given some sort of
training. 

Later, Ashok Reddy manages to complain to court about this torture.  He is
examined by the state doctor, a friend of Korate's, who diagnosed his
condition as piles and exonerated the officer. 24

Sometimes such torture results in death.  Maharashtra still retains the
privilege of having the highest number of custodial deaths in India - 22 in
2011, way ahead of second-placed Gujarat with 7.

Sadistic police officers

[names, as in the following, are anonymized] 

Among my more sadistic interrogators was Abhishek Kapur, the Deputy
Commissioner of Police in charge of Crime for Nagpur. He was a strapping
young IPS officer, always striving for the favour of his seniors. Terrorist
bashing would definitely get him a few more credits. 

While interrogating me, he would make it a point to make me squat on the
ground handcuffed, while he sat on a chair in front of me. His ego would
swell every time he looked down at me and asserted that he was from Delhi's
prestigious St. Stephen's college, a statement intended to demonstrate that
he was a class apart from other officers. 

If I chose to remain silent to his questions, he would kick my jaw with his
boots. I came to realise that I had been strategically placed so that he
could use minimum effort to do so." p.11-12

[interestingly, in this instance, AF himself was also a graduate of one of
Bombay's elite colleges!  Yet another irony unmentioned by AF.]

Narco-analysis and ECG tests

When all their tactics failed, the police got the court to allow them to 
subject Ashok Reddy and me to the scientifically dubious practice of 
narco-analysis, lie detectors and brain-mapping tests.  p.13 

[is handcuffed to the berth during the train journey to Mumbai for the
narco tests. but is issued a sandals - all these days he had been going
everywhere, including to court, barefoot. ]

I was taken to a soundproof room similar to a recording studio.  
Thirty-two electrodes were attached to my scalp and I was made to 
listen to a series of statements on headphones, many regarding my 
involvement in the alleged offences.  The electrodes would record my 
responses - map the electrical discharges in my brain and allegedly 
determine whetheer I had any "experiential knowledge" of the event.  

When I was finally given the report after several months, I learnt 
that this purportedly scieentific test inferred that I had repeatedly 
lied, even about my name and being married: 

Probe: My name is Arun Ferreira -> NIL experiential knowledge 

Probe: I am married -> NIL experiential knowledge p.23 

(One of the narco- tests was conducted by the notorious forensic
psychologist S. Malini, who was later sacked for having forged her credentials.)

Nagpur Central Jail

On 20 May, 2007, I stooped to enter the low, narrow door of Nagpur Central 
Prison.   p.15

[original arrest: 8 May.  Twelve days in PCR / interrogation.  ]

jail vocabulary - most of these words are continuing from the british era. 
   * naya aamad : jail slang for new entrant.  
   * kaidi : convicted prisoner 
   * havalathi(pron. hauladi): undertrial 
   * mulaiza : check-in process.  A body ticket given to every prisoner 
   * jhadati-amaldar : official in charge of strip-search 

The gate officer is supposed to enquire whether the new prisoner has
suffered injuries due to torture in police custody.

I had a bleeding ear, swillen jaws, and sore feet.  

In reality, the officer threatens anyone trying to make a complaint.  By
custom, all injuries are recorded as having existed before the prisoner was
arrested.

The prison bhai

Each barrack had its bhai to whom all lesser mortals claimed (or aspired
to) proximity . Those who managed to get close to the bhai could hope for
some alleviation of discomfort in the form of a cleaner or full set of
bistar (bedding).  p.40

Though the Prison Manual prescribed that the bistar
allocated to each prisoner should include a dhurrie, a bedsheet, two
cotton-wool blankets in winter and a pillow with pillow-case, the naya
aamad (newcomer) could consider himself lucky if he managed to get a single
tattered, filthy blanket or dhurrie. And even if he did obtain a dhurrie,
this did not ensure that the dhurrie-possessor would find the 2 ft x 6 ft
floor space needed to lay it out on-because the barracks, designed for 75
prisoners, were occupied by more than 200. This was another thing that a
bhai could fix.

--Overcrowded sleep-- 

With each inmate living through his own private nightmare, moans, groans
and sobs from adjoining sleepers were frequent. The awakened neighbour
usually slapped the offender into silence. But not all troubled souls were
so easily subdued. There were those who pierced the night with shrill
screams and shrieks and were usually beaten up before they quietened. The
screamer, who actually needed psychiatric help, didn't even get sympathy.
As the whole barrack was roused, the more vicious types joined the watchmen
in beating and kicking him.  p.45

Many believed it to be the only possible therapy to exorcise the devil
which had taken possession of the troubled man. In a while, he was silenced
and relative calm descended once more. But sleep was elusive as each
prisoner strained silently to hide from his own demons.


overcrowding in sleep. sketch by Ferreira, from the Open Magazine;

Meetings with family

At the mulakaat, my parents could only see my silhouette behind the wire
mesh. I too could barely make out the colour of the clothes they were
wearing. They could recognize me only by my voice. The wire mesh ensured that
only voices could be exchanged. No reassuring hugs.  52

`Were you beaten badly?' my mother asked.Dad sat silently beside her,
avoiding direct eye contact. If I were to answer truthfully, it would only
cause them more pain.  

'No. It's all part of the struggle,' I said, trying to change the flow of the
conversation. But even through the mesh, I knew that they'd seen the emotions
my smile was attempting to hide.  My mom easily understood the language of
struggle.

Through my years in jail, my son Akshay never got to see me. We decided
against telling him that I was in prison. If he had come, he'd have to see a
silhouette with fettered hands for a father. We felt that this would be too
much for a 2-year-old child to understand.

Only five hours each day are allotted for mulakaats, so if a large number
of families show up, each gets a shorter visit. Sometimes, just five
minutes into meeting with my family, the jail official at the mulakaat desk
would start hammering his gavel to signal that time was up...A wailing
child who had been longing for a touch from his father would barely have
managed a glimpse of him. A weeping spouse yearning to pour out her heart
would barely have got past the initial greetings. A protesting prisoner
would not have managed to run through his long list of errands and messages
to pass on.All had to be torn away from the windows as the next batch of
prisoners rushed in to take their place.

Only prisoners with political or economical clout - therefore the most
dangerous ones - could avoid the meshing and meet their families leisurely,
face-to-face in the superintendent's office.  

The worse affected were perhaps the children, who had to reconcile
themselves to a parent penned up like a chimpanzee's cage. 55

Corruption in the prison hospital

The prison hospital was a great institution, with the Doctor in-Charge
(DIC) as its presiding deity.  The prison manual provides the DIC with
absolute powers.  This has resulted in the rise of a breed of DICs who seem
determined to prove the cliche that ansolute power corrupts absolutely.

The sundry permissions, sanctions, and recommendations in the DIC's kitty
were all available for a price.  Special diets, admission to the prison
hospital, and referrals to hospitals outside the jail were the most
remunerative commodities on offer. 84

as usual, it was the bhais who cornered these scarce resources... 
those most in need of medical care [often dont get it, unless vociferous.] 

the prison doctor (often reached after scuffles) would not prescribe the
whole dose lest we misuse it to end our lives.  thus partial antibiotic
treatment in indian prisons has perhaps made an ample contribution to
India's inventory of superbugs.

--Fast bathing-- 

Morning brings a mad rush to the tanki or haus, as the bathing tank is
known. Four hundred prospective bathers laying claim to a 60 by 3 foot
trough means a hurried bath even at the best of times. In summer, when the
water being pumped out of the well is likely to run dry, the pace is bound
to be frantic. 

Jail lore tells of the guy who's not fast enough and has to
rinse off the soap by catching the drops dripping off his neighbour's
body. The ones who don't learn to brush teeth, take a bath and rinse out
their underwear in 10 minutes flat are destined to scrape the bottom of the
haus. p.92

Prison meals

   * dopahar bhaTTa : lunch, 10-11AM.  However if facing a court session,
	the court bhaTTa would be served at 8am immediately after breakfast.
   * shyam bhaTTa : dinner. 3 to 4pm. 

   * taapa kamaan : convicts handling food distribution for 2000 inmates
   * bhisi kamaan : carting provisions from godown to kitchen (bhisi).
   * handi : private cooking or spicing up of prison food; also - group
		of prisoners eating together. 
   * danda kamaan : convicts cleaning the toilets etc. (usu. low-caste)
   * jhadu kamaan : fill in water in the peepas. 

Meat treat : Hunting squirrels and bandicoot

Practices that would seem bizarre in the outside world became routine
behind the walls. For instance, the trapping and hunting of squirrels,
birds, bandicoots and other types of small game was a serious occupation
because the Maharashtra government had imposed a near-total ban on
non-vegetarian food in prison. 

Even locusts and other insects that occasionally swarmed the prison were
collected, to be sun dried, roasted and relished. Cloth traps sometimes
managed to snare a bird. Others were brought down with makeshift
catapults. 79

Traps in drainpipes and other passages could be made to yield
bandicoots. But the more popular method for both squirrels and rats was
hunting by hand and stick.

If one was sighted, the cry went up and the hunters gathered to corner
their prey... A well-fed bandicoot-- which tastes a lot like pork-- was a
sizeable feast for a meat-starved group. It was quickly skinned and cooked
in a corner, away from the prying eyes of jail staff and their
informants. The spot behind the la trines was considered safe. This was
done on the watch of the latrine-cleaning danda-kamaan, who are usually
low-castes or tribals.  
[bandicoot = giant bandicoot rat - upto 40cm long]


cooking (handi) behind the prison toilets.  the most active 
hunters were usually the latrine cleaning danda-kamaans. 

They were omnivorous and enthusiastic participants in both the chase and
the feast. As the band sat around for the treat, the conversation would
drift back to better times.

One person would talk of wild boars, an other remembered rabbits. The high
walls and iron bars would fade away. Things weren't as bad as they seemed.
p.80 

Books in prison

Manages to get access to a number of novels (shared among English readers
in prison): Frederick Forsyth's Avenger, Vikram Chandra's Sacred Games
(many similar mafia characters in prison), 
Khaled Hosseini's Kite Runner [the praise for this in the western media
is its emotional justification for occupying Afghanistan.  57

newspapers were devoured - often re-read.  Prison manual prescribes a
newspaper for every 20 - but in practice prisoners would have to purchase
their papers.  

Any news of corruption or violence by prison officials would be excised; on
some occasions, we received the newspaper in shreds. 60

crime fiction : Lee Child / John Grisham - were a hit due to the courtroom
	drama 

From 2008 to 2011, he does a PG correspondence course in Human Rights from
the Indian Institute of Human Rights, Delhi.  The stash of textbooks in his
solitary cell became a source of much commment.  77

To many prisoners, studying was similar to the fasting and prayers that
they took up to focus their minds and pass the time. 

Muslim share in Maharashtra prison population: 36%
	(whereas only 11% of the population are Muslim). 69

Prisoners are not entitled to vote.  However, undertrials can stand
elections.




Links: 
* Excerpts : 	bushywood.com
		open magazine

* Arun Ferreira's blog: https://arunferreira.wordpress.com

* scroll.in
* HT review
* IndExp review
* The Hindu review
* Mid-Day review
* sunday-guardian

Other books on Indian Prisons (list by Ferreira)

* Bhagat Singh: THE JAIL NOTEBOOK (1929)
	These foolscap notes by Bhagat Singh could see light of day only
	after a prison hunger strike in 1929. 
* MY YEARS IN AN INDIAN PRISON by Mary Tyler, 1977
	Tyler was married to the Naxalite Amalendu Sen.  spent five years as
	undertrial in Bihar jails. 
* CAPTIVE IMAGINATION: LETTERS FROM PRISON by Varavara Rao Penguin, 2010
	A political prisoner during emergency, Varavara Rao spent ten years
	in prison. 
* MY DAYS IN PRISON by Iftikhar Gilani, Penguin 2005
	 Iftikhar Gilani is a journalist, who was arrested under the Official
	 Secrets Act.  Spent seven months in Tihar in 2002. 
* PRISONER NO. 100: THE STORY OF MY ORDEAL IN AN INDIAN PRISON, by Anjum
  Zamarud Habib, Zubaan 2011 
	A kashmiri woman is implicated under POTA in 2003 and spends four
	years in prison. 

* THE BAD BOYS OF BOKARO JAIL by Chetan Mahajan, Penguin 2014
	Chetan Mahajan was CEO of an IIT Coaching center, Everonn Toppers, in
	Bokaro  [all charges against him have been absolved]

full article:
http://booksy.in/2014/10/03/six-prison-books-from-india-picked-by-arun-ferreira/

Ferreira's counter-case - suing for compensation

			from Hindustan Times Jan 2012

Ferreira has filed a petition before the Nagpur bench of Bombay high court
against the state authorities [seeking] compensation of Rs 25 lakh.

Justice AH Joshi had served notices to the state home secretary, the jail
authorities and seven other respondents for allegedly harassing him since
his arrest in 2007.

While filing the petition, Ferreira said that the jail authorities and
state police had violated his fundamental rights of liberty. Whenever he
was released by the lower court, he was allegedly abducted by the police
from the Nagpur central prison premises in connivance with the jail
authorities and was re-arrested by them on other charges.

He urged the court to direct the state to compensate him Rs 25 lakh and
book the police and jail authorities who have re-arrested him several times
on ‘flimsy’ grounds after acquitting from the lower courts. Ferreira also
demanded a judicial inquiry by a retired high court judge or a sitting
session judge to probe his abduction from prison and re-arrest after
release from the court.

Ferreira said that the act of the police and the jail authorities were
criminal, arbitrary and malafide. "The authorities were putting him in the
jail deliberately without a speedy trial," he contended and sought an
apology from the state machinery.

[This is a case worth following.  It would be important to prevent it from 
getting overrun in the deluge of cases. ]