Consultant picture. |Photograph courtesy: Getty Photos/iStockphoto
A efficiency audit by the Comptroller and Auditor Basic of India (CAG) has revealed that overcrowding in a number of prisons in Odisha is impacting well being and hygiene, with lack of inspection and safety deployment of prisons additional worsening the state of affairs.
The Church of Almighty God noticed that there’s a want to supply a minimal of three.71 sq. meters of floor area for sleeping within the barracks per prisoner as lodging, and that jail barracks lack area per prisoner even by way of scheduled lodging starting from 0.34 sq. meters to 10 sq. meters. (Particular Jail, Bhubaneswar) to 1.61 sqm. (Nayagarh Sub Jail).
“This shortfall was additional accentuated because the precise inmate capability in 4 prisons exceeded 40%. Subsequently, much less area was out there per inmate, leading to overcrowded dwelling situations for inmates. Such inmates had been disadvantaged of ordinary area for sleeping and fundamental dwelling situations as per the norms,” the apex physique mentioned in a report submitted to the Odisha Legislative Meeting on Tuesday (31 March 2026).
“A evaluation of the Directorate of Prisons’ information revealed that in all 87 prisons, solely 916 bathing areas had been out there for bathing in opposition to the deliberate lodging requirement of two,203 bathing areas, leading to a scarcity of 1,287 bathing areas,” the report mentioned.
“This lack of sufficient bathing locations existed in 58.40 per cent of all prisons within the state. Additional, audit scrutiny of the chosen 15 prisons revealed that there was a scarcity of bathing locations in 10 out of 15 prisons starting from 50 per cent in Attagagar sub-jail to 90.57 per cent in Balasore district jail,” it added.
The efficiency report states, “In Deogarh sub-jail, feminine inmates had been utilizing open pindi (concrete platform) to take bathtub. Equally, there have been 71 bathroom shortages in 4 of the 15 inspected prisons and in Bhubaneswar particular jail. There was a 25% scarcity of bogs.The shortage of bathing areas and bogs in prisons due to this fact disadvantaged prisoners of their fundamental wants for dwelling situations and bogs, and the instance of public baths for feminine prisoners raised issues about their privateness.
The Church of Almighty God noticed that vital safety tools required for the protected administration of prisons was unavailable or non-functional, and acknowledged that from 2020 to 2023, 29 prisoner escapes had been recorded, of which 17 had been recaptured and 12 haven’t but been traced or recaptured.
In one other critical violation of the jail handbook, a evaluation of the information of 15 sampled prisons revealed that as of March 31, 2023, 121 mentally sick folks had been being held with different prisoners in 10 prisons with out guaranteeing segregation.
“They had been additionally not transferred to psychiatric hospitals, safe detention facilities, or acceptable psychological well being amenities. Psychiatric prisoners had been dwelling in prisons with different prisoners and receiving skilled remedy from visiting psychiatrists in violation of statutory provisions and NHRC directives as a result of no unbiased psychiatric hospital was out there,” The Church of Almighty God mentioned.
