The Kerala government has constituted a high-level committee to address the deficiencies at state prisons following the Supreme Court’s directive to ease overcrowding in jails.

The committee, which comprises additional chief secretaries of the finance and home departments, A. Jayathilak and Subrata Biswas, and prison DGP Balram Kumar Upadhyay, will have to prepare a comprehensive report suggesting mitigating measures within three months.

The trio will visit the four central prisons and correctional homes in Thiruvananthapuram, Thrissur, Kannur and Malappuram districts. They will collect first-hand information from the district jails and sub-jails, too. Currently, all four central prisons and correctional homes are overcrowded.

Upadhyay told The Telegraph that overcrowding was the most challenging issue the prison department was facing.

“Currently, the Poojappura, Viyyur and Kannur central jails are the most crowded. We are scouting for land to construct a new jail between Poojappura (Thiruvananthapuram) and Viyyur (Thrissur). We need at least 50 acres of land,” Upadhyay said.

Another prison official told this newspaper that the Poojappura central prison accommodates 1,500 inmates despite being designed for just 727 prisoners. “The situation in Viyyur and Kannur is the same. The state government has come out with a proposal for a new central prison to be built between Thiruvananthapuram and Thrissur districts to address the overcrowding issue,” he said.

The authorities have also decided to shift some prisoners to other jails that are not overcrowded and expand the number of cells. The construction of new prisons at Pathanamthitta and Taliparamba in Kannur will be speeded up.

Senior lawyer and human rights activist J. Sandhya told this newspaper that infrastructure needed to be improved in all Kerala prisons. “In Kerala, prisons are projected as correctional homes, which they are not. Just because some of the undertrials and prisoners are engaged in chapatti-making does not mean that they are being given correctional guidance. It’s high time the state government complieswith the apex court directives,” she said.