A few days after the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) acting on a complaint filed by lawyer and rights activist Radhakanta Tripathy asked the Odisha Human Rights Commission (OHRC) to act over the persistent human rights violation at Bhadrak Sub-Jail,
Tripathy has again moved the NHRC over the death of an inmate at the jail. “The highly over crowded prisoners have been subjected to human rights violation as the guidelines for prisons and human rights remain merely words of dictionary for them. The jail authorities, including the IG (Prisons) are yet to act over the issue. The excuse is that the tender has not been passed or something else,” the petitioner contended.
The petitioner maintained that though he personally sat on a hunger strike in front of the jail the pre-Independence era jail has been over crowded about five times than its strength. “This amounts to serious violation of human rights,” Tripathy alleged. Tripathy said the death of Sridhar Jena, a prisoner must be enquired.
Earlier in 2012 on a reply to the petition filed by Tripathy the IG (Prisons) assured of a new modern jail for the Bhadrak district at Amargadia, at a cost of Rs 12,20,57,000 which is yet to materialise.
The convicts who are serving rigorous imprisonment are kept as simple prisoners due to lack of employment facilities that amounts to contempt of court, Tripathy mentioned.