Jails for rent in Telangana, any takers?

Telangana has offered its jail for rent, at Rs 10,000 per month per inmate The cells are not for convicts and undertrials for serious offences, but only for petty crime accused The Telangana jail has a capacity of 6,848 inmates and currently it has 6,063 inmates only Renting out the jail cells will have revenue of Rs 25 crore per annum

Renting a house or office is common, but a jail for rent? Yes, Telangana has offered its jail for rent. At a ‘meager’ sum of Rs 10,000 per month per inmate, reported Kannada Prabha. Most of the jails in India are over-crowded. There are complaints of crowding cells with more inmates than specified limits. However, Telangana says it has jail filled with under capacity and wants to rent out jail cells to other states. Cells will be rented for Rs 10,000 per month. However, these cells are not for convicts and undertrials for serious offences. They are available only for petty crime accused. The jail cells are open for renting from next year and Telangana has called applications from all states, according to chief prison director VK Singh.

The Telangana jail has a capacity of 6,848 inmates and currently it has 6,063 inmates only. The rest of the cells are vacant. Hence, it has decided to offer the cells for rent to accommodate 800 inmates. If the proposal is approved by the government, the jail will have revenue of Rs 25 crore per annum, Singh said.

If Rs 10,000 per month seems expensive the reason given is it includes the place, food, provision to meet relatives and the expenses of training at jail, Singh said. In Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, the expenses of maintaining an inmate is Rs 120 per day that amounts to Rs 43,880 per year. Telangana expects Karnataka, Maharashtra, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh where jail are crowded to make use of this facility, reports Kannada Prabha. 

Incidentally, Norway has high security jails but the rate of crime is reducing by day. Hence most of the jails are vacant and it decided to rent out jails to neighbouring countries.