Your chance to experience a day in jail, just for Rs500

Hyderabad - Now, you can experience a day in an over 200 years old jail for a mere Rs500 as part of a new educative tourism experience.

A society which does not spend enough to build good schools for its children will be forced to cough up more to build jails for its adults. Across centuries, the jail, has been a dreaded sordid but permanent reality of every society; and an experience reserved for its worst, and finest at times, people.
Now, you can experience a day in an over 200 years old jail for a mere Rs500 as part of a new educative tourism experience created when an innovative idea came to V.K. Singh, Director-General of Jails, of the Telangana state police.
"It was an old jail and we have stopped using it as a prison for many years now. When we reviewed it, we found the building was getting dilapidated, and hence, we transformed it into a kind of records office. The DGP felt we must preserve the prisons and create a unique cultural experience out of them. Why not offer ordinary people who have no experience of a prison - except through their notions formed through movies - for a day on a voluntary basis? That is how India's first jail tourism project idea was born," said Santosh Kumar, Deputy Superintendent of Jails.
After restoration work for several months, the formerly Old District Central Jail in the Sangareddy town of Medak district in the state, became the Heritage Jail Museum, and was inaugurated by State Home Minister Nayani Narasimha Reddy on June 5, earlier this year.
In India, this will be the first prison being opened up as a museum for general public, with the unique experience to be a prisoner for a day. On payment of Rs500, you will be taken into the prison, given a prisoner kit, comprising a dress, a bedsheet. "The food and water served are the same as consumed by prisoners across the state. Your mobile phone is confiscated and all your contacts with the external world are severed. You would be locked up in your cell - to be shared or spent in isolation - based on the numbers of other prison tourists," said Kumar.
The prison has three guards, and eight other staffers looking after the maintenance of the museum.
"The prison, with its history of over two centuries, has lots of tales to share. It has an ambience and a feel. The opening up on the museum has led to heightened interest across the section of society, including bureaucrats, college students, and even political leaders," he said.
Currently, the place has found great attention from journalists covering the unique experience to general public, who are coming to see the place from 'outside'.
"There are several misconceptions about a prison, including being a place where monsters are locked and tortured. A jail museums humanizes our perception about prisons, people locked up here, under-trials, even people who work here. You would appreciate that they are all part of society and part of the reason they are here is to reform and rejoin the mainstream," he said.
Responding to the possibility of a day in jail, spent voluntarily, several people felt fascinated by the idea and a likely trip soon.
Rohit Lingineni, a marketing and brand consultant from Melbourne Business School, said he was enchanted by the idea. "I am pretty sure I would never go to a jail based on my actions in life. This is the nearest to get a sense of it. I am hoping they will allow me a book to take along, so I can spend the night reading. Besides, maybe we will be able to better appreciate the value of our freedom and liberty after a day there."
Srinivasa Rao Apparasu, a senior journalist from Hindustan Times, who became the country's first jail tourist, enjoyed the re-reading of Crime and Punishment, and confessed the book felt more real than during any earlier read.
Ashim Avtar Dash, technology consultant and social entrepreneur, said: "I would surely go there and spend a day. Having done so much work with Public Interest Litigations and different aspects of social realities, I feel this can complete me as a citizen. And if this became a part of college work, more youth might make decisions in life more carefully and avoid a real prison term."
Kumar concurs. "Most people who are actually arrested and imprisoned break up during the first few hours, and are shocked by the end of the first day - deeply transformed. They might not have committed the crime if they knew the pain of confinement and suspension of liberty. Maybe this will indeed be able to make such an impact on society. We sure hope so."
Prison has also shaped personalities positively, including leaders of the Indian freedom struggle. Maybe the tour can indeed become a part of various sections of society and serve as an educational tool. Who knows what a jail may teach? And if it only can teach people, especially the youth, to stay away from coming back - the museum would have served society more gloriously than it has done in its past.
Time will tell.

• India