Exploring Prisons: Maximum Security or Maximum Insecurity?

A prison or jail is a facility where individuals are confined and punished for a variety of offenses and crimes, and as part of this, prison inmates are denied certain freedoms (Bhargava, 2018). India’s prison system has evolved over the years to be well-organized, multidimensional and complex. There were many modifications in prison administrations along the way to increase efficiency where the offenders are confined to prison in accordance to offense committed, the inmates are allowed to meet their family members and celebrate festivals etc. (Bhargava, 2018). Recently, the Supreme Court has been concerned with the right to justice, protection and fair treatment of the inmates and has mandated for prisons and officials to make sure that they are not subjected to extremely violative and inhumane conditions of living. However, presently, this is definitely not the case. There are problems of overcrowding and mismanagement of prisons, inadequate food and clothes and neglect of hygiene and health. There are special privileges accorded to the upper and middle class/caste prisoners with regard to special food and bathing packets and comfortable cells (Kashyap, 2022). A majority of inmates who are not able to afford counsel are detained without having been tried. The country’s legal aid panels are not able to support the inflow of prisoners and offenders. To that extent, how are prisons a subject of security? What role do inmates play in the overarching structure of securitization? How do biopower and biopolitics operate in the context of prisons? This blog strives to navigate the above questions in the larger context of the securitization debate, speech act and power over death.

Figure 1. Prisoners in Tamil Nadu’s Puzhal Jail interact with visiting family members through a separating panel.

Security as a concept has always been associated with defense, military and nation-states. It is very important to establish that it should encompass broader and deeper axes. Of course, this has to be done sensibly, with respect to not saturating it; formulating an alternative concept of security that is more inclusive of human survival, development, freedom and identity is important (Wæver, 1995). This alternative security has to be in interaction with national security and its proponents, but must inherently de-link itself from the conventional conception of security (Wæver, 1995). There must be specific fields of social interactions, actions and agents along with threats and vulnerabilities. Prison is one such field site which can be securitized, that challenges the military/state focus of security, where security can be contextualized at the individual’s and collective’s level.

The Copenhagen School argues that securitization can take place only when the referent object (prison inmates) is formally declared as being existentially threatened (Hansen, 2000) by the threat object (state, the overstepping judicial/legal structure, prison administration, other inmates and guards/officials). This means that prisoners need to be declared as the referent object in a way that there is a socially powerful argument and backing that a certain group is threatened. In relation to this, securitizing actors – those who securitize issues by declaring someone as a referent object – play a vital role. Generally, they are political leaders, bureaucracies, governments etc. (Hansen, 2000). There have been many lawyers, senior advocates, media channels and reporters who have worked to bring forth and securitize the plight of the prisoners. However, the success of these securitizing actors can be debated on the basis of gaining large acceptance of threat, because, the state has time and again been able shut down media coverage and reportage. Cases of custodial rape and death have been covered up and any kind of speech act on part of the prisoners is trampled upon. Hence, any and every institutionalized injustice goes unnoticed and consequently, is blatantly ignored. Caste-based treatment like segregation of manual/menial work, allocation of separate smaller/shabbier cells, incremental physical violence etc. (Rajagopal, 2024) are concealed. A kind of racism/discrimination and biologizing on the part of the state can be seen here (Foucault, 1990). This shows that security has been articulated from the lens of the elites, whose positionality allows them to define the “class/objective interests” of the inmates/society and decide what gets to be securitized (Wæver, 1995). They reinstall a particular kind of truth, imposing their will on the majority (Wæver, 1995). Such power holders use securitization of prisons and inmates merely as a political tool for personal advances – to get rid of certain groups and confine them to jails, to silence activists/critics of the government and to warn the public that any activity against the norm would result in immediate arrest (Roy, 2022). The people in power have often brought prisons into the realm of securitization only when the lives of important political prisoners were at stake and needed protection and hence, there is a need for de-securitization.

Figure 2. A prisoner inmate being stripped and beaten publicly in Kasna Jail, Uttar Pradesh.

Through the speech act in security, there is a particular reinforcement of the subject; however, as stated by Butler, ‘one can be interpellated, put in place, given a place, through silence, through not being addressed’ (Hansen, 2000). In the context of prisons, it is important to take into consideration the verbal and non-verbal communication. Article 21 of the Indian constitution mandates “that no person’s personal liberty shall be deprived except when there is proper legal procedure regarding the same” (Sharma, 2020) and this is inclusive of their right to speech to the extent where it does not interfere with the status of a jail inmate. However, this is certainly not the case and more often than not, the prisoners have no concrete and safe space to speak up about the inhumane treatment and if at all they do, they are immediately hushed, or worse. However, visual representation of images and videos via social media and news channels have drawn attention to the conditions of prisoners. There is an affective relation between speech and bodily expression where even with verbal silence, security can be spoken through the body (Hansen, 2000). Prisoners allegedly die of different diseases, are beaten and raped to close-death and in this utmost silence, identity and security are performatively constituted in the body. The individual/mass prison suicides and burial of prisoners all over the country portrays collective insecurity being spoken through body and bodily acts and this inscribes the prisoners as being threatened with no protection whatsoever.

Figure 3. Jail personnel booked in Kerala for inhumane torture and murder of prisoner.

Figure 4. Four prisoners booked by Pune City Police for beating up, stabbing and murdering another prisoner.

Foucault talks about biopower, wherein the state regulates subjects through different techniques/mediums to subjugate bodies and populations. There can be seen biopower at play through the rigorous disciplining and punishment of a select group of inmates on the basis of caste/class and different other reasons. There is governmental regulation and administration with the scores of prisoners as a collective, all across India. Prisons sought out to produce docile bodies through strict rules, regulations and timetables along with taking away certain rights (contextual) and, even though there are loopholes and escapes for privileged prisoners, there is routine production and management of compliant prisoners where they themselves do not deviate from the set structure and model prison behavior. There are panopticon-like structures built in the prisons for maximum surveillance, visibility and visualization where there is no need for a power to be in control; most of the prisoners make sure to control themselves – there truly is minimum government and maximum governance. The state facilitates an assembly line production of utilitarian bodies in these prisons where the individuals are nothing but mere robots (automata). It is compulsory for the prisoners to work or go for vocational training as part of their sentence/imprisonment. In the cases where it is stated that they will receive wages, as per the Minimum Wages Act (Lakshman, 2024), they still end up working without pay. The prison officials in charge do not the clock the accurate number of hours that they have worked for and assign different kinds of work solely on the basis of the inmates’ identity. The inmates are nothing but mere bodies inserted into the machinery of production to increase capitalistic output via disciplinary and regulatory methods.

Figure 5. Inmates of Coimbatore Central Prison cleaning a special court premises.

Foucault places biopower in the context of it being the power to sustain life, where, even with the extreme regulation and regimentation, there is life still being lived (Foucault, 1990). When it comes to prisons, taking charge of lives through the different mandates, rules, harsh living conditions etc. is more impactful than controlling deaths and this kind of access to the body translates into heightened jurisdiction and dominance. This biological existence is synonymous to mere animality that permeates into political existence. However, is this life that is so carefully ensured, viable? Mbembe points to the blurred lines between life and death (Mbembe, 2003). Necropolitics, the politics of death, is where the subjects’ lives are no longer politically significant in any manner and they are, essentially, the ‘living dead’ (Mbembe, 2003). This is very visible in the case of prisons where the individuals are stripped off of their identity and do not matter in the larger scheme of prisons – inmates will just replace other inmates.

There is a hierarchy among the prisoners as well, on the basis of intersectional identities, the news of death, torture and rape of the powerless prisoners are given no regard and they are rendered politically invisible, almost extinct. With regard to the mobius strip, where one can never be certain as to what constitutes security and not insecurity, the lines between the two can be obscured. The state shielding the rest of the population from criminals or deviants is a securitizing act in itself and is a source of security for the common public. With that in mind, it is imperative to understand that this in turn is a great source of insecurity for the referent object, the prisoners, and this collective construction and perception of (in)security faced must be brought to light. The epistemological discourse, as subjective as it might be, must be broken down and scrutinized. The state’s conception of security is fundamentally dissymmetrical to the security needed by that of the prisoners and, this is what has to be worked through more critically going forward.

References

Bhargava, Rishabh. “A Critical Study of Prison Reforms in India,” 2018, www.penacclaims.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Rishabh-Bhargava.pdf.

Foucault, Michel. The history of sexuality: An introduction. Trans. Robert Hurley. New York: Vintage 95 (1990). (Selection: Part Five: Right of Death and Power over Life)

Hansen, Lene. 2000. ‘The Little Mermaid’s Silent Security Dilemma and the Absence of Gender in the Copenhagen School’. Millennium 29 (2): 285–306.

Kashyap, Shubham. “Major Problems of Prison System in India.” Times of India Blog, 1 Jan. 2022, timesofindia.indiatimes.com/readersblog/shubham-kashyap/major-problems-of-prison-system-in-india-40079/.

Lakshman, Abhinay. “Right to Wages behind Bars: Paid Labour Lies at the Heart of the Prison Reform System but Wages Are Poor in Nearly Every State.” The Hindu, 16 Mar. 2024, www.thehindu.com/society/prison-labour-fair-wages-lacking-reform-rehabilitation-india-jails-tihar-tamil-nadu-kerala-bihar-maharashtra/article67941845.ece.

Mbembe, Achille. 'Necropolitics.' Public culture 15, no. 1 (2003): 11-40.

Ole, Wæver. 1995. “Securitization and Desecuritization.” In On Security, edited by Ronnie Lipschutz. New York: Columbia University Press. https://www.libraryofsocialscience.com/assets/pdf/Waever-Securitization.pdf

Rajagopal, Krishnadas. “Supreme Court Seeks Response from Centre, States on Caste Discrimination in Prisons.” The Hindu, 3 Jan. 2024, www.thehindu.com/news/national/supreme-court-seeks-response-from-centre-states-on-caste-discrimination-in-prisons/article67701105.ece.

Roy, Partho Sarothi. “Political Prisoners Unite the British Raj and ‘New India.’” The Wire, 13 Sept. 2022, thewire.in/rights/political-prisoners-unite-the-british-raj-and-new-india.

Sharma, Devanshi. “To What Extent Can Prisoners Enjoy Fundamental Rights under Article 21.” Legal Service India - Law, Lawyers and Legal Resources, www.legalserviceindia.com/legal/article-11829-to-what-extent-can-prisoners-enjoy-fundamental-rights-under-article-21.html#:~:text=This%20article%20makes%20sure%20that,brutality%2C%20cruelty%2C%20and%20barbarity.

Figure 1 - Aurora, Bhavna. “Right to Justice Bill: Helplessness, Psychological Disorders    Torture Indian Prisoners.” India Today, India Today, 26 June 2011, www.indiatoday.in/magazine/special-report/story/20110704-right-to-justice-bill-jails-turn-into-nightmares-for-undertrials-746616-2011-06-24.

Figure 2 - “Exposed: Up’s Hell Prison Where Inmates Suffer Vicious Torture and Corruption.” India Today, India Today, 8 Sept. 2016, www.indiatoday.in/india/story/exposed-ups-hell-prison-where-inmates-suffer-vicious-torture-and-corruption-339802-2016-09-07.

Figure 3 - “Custodial Torture: Murder Charges against 6 Jailers.” Onmanorama, www.onmanorama.com/content/mm/en/kerala/top-news/2020/11/10/viyyur-custodial-torture-murder-charges-against-jailers.html.

Figure 4 - “Attacked by 4 Inmates with Scissors, Piece of Metal Hinge, Undertrial Killed in Yerawada Central Prison.” The Indian Express, 29 Dec. 2023, indianexpress.com/article/cities/pune/undertrial-yerawada-prison-killed-4-fellow-inmates-9086613/.

Figure 5 - Lakshman, Abhinay. “Right to Wages behind Bars: Paid Labour Lies at the Heart of the Prison Reform System but Wages Are Poor in Nearly Every State.” The Hindu, 16 Mar. 2024, www.thehindu.com/society/prison-labour-fair-wages-lacking-reform-rehabilitation-india-jails-tihar-tamil-nadu-kerala-bihar-maharashtra/article67941845.ece.