Sushma Sahu, member of National Women Commission, inspected Suddhowala jail and Nari Niketan. At the jail, she met the women inmates in a bid to learn how they were living.
While talking to The Pioneer, Sahu said she enquired into the conditions they were living under and the facilities they are being provided with by the jail authorities. Sahu said that she had also visited male wards to find that the wards were cramped. She was surprised to find 80 male inmates were being kept there where the normal figure is 20. In case of the female wards, 30 female inmates are being kept while the ward should ideally have 20.
She expressed annoyance over the fact that while vocational training is being imparted to the male inmates the women inmates are being deprived of it.
Sahu said that the Central government has launched skill up-gradation training programme. This should be implemented here to benefit the women prisoners, she said.
She directed the jail authorities to transfer a female constable who is allegedly using abusive language with the women inmates of the jail.
She sounded annoyed over the unhygienic condition prevailing in Nari Niketan, the State-run shelter home for the women in distress.
Notably, the home shot into the headlines after one of the inmates was found pregnant and several were found ill and hospitalised. She said that the women superintendent for the home was yet to be appointed. A teacher who has been appointed there is working as in-charge in Nari Niketan, she said.