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3. The staff in the jail hospital has to be increased by providing at least 2 more Doctors preferably who have specialised in the particular field where the prisoners may require their services in special cases. One Lade Medical Officer, a Lady Nurse and two lady attendants for the purpose of attending the women prisoners. The location of their office may be provided in the separate block meant for women prisoners. If regular posting of Doctors cannot be made for the purposes stated above, the services of the Doctors from other Government Hospitals in Bangalore may be secured as a routine periodically or in case of emergencies by providing them some conveyance. It is suggested that doctors incharged of the Hospital may visit each barrack at least once in a week and meet the inmates to know their health problems and to treat them in jail Hospital. In case of emergency as agreed by them, they may visit the prisoners whenever their services are required.

10. It may be necessary to instruct follow up action by all the concerned Authorities in regard to the implementation of the items stated above."

10. We wish to place on record our appreciation for the admirable work done by the District Judge.

11. Being concerned with a problem which is not confined to the happenings in Central Jail, Bangalore, but which are faced more of less by all the persons confined in 1155 prisons of different kinds in India, we have thought it fit not to confine our attention and concern to what was found in the Central Jail by the District Judge. According to us, it would be more apposite to keep in view all the prisoners, whose population at the end of 1993 was 1,93,240, of whom 1,37,838 were unconvicted remandees or undertrials.

12. It may be pointed that the National Human Rights Commission is also of the view that the prison system as such is in need of reform, nation-wide. (See para 4.18 of these aforesaid Report).

13. The literature on prison justice and prison reform shows that there are nine major problems which afflict the system and which need immediate attention. These are : (1) overcrowding; (2) delay in trial ; (3) torture and ill- treatment; (4) neglect of health and hygiene; (5) insubstantial food and inadequate clothing ; (6) prison vices; (7) deficiency in communication; (8) streamlining o jail visits; and (9) management of open air prisons.

47. While on the subject of prayer, mention may be made about the experiment carried out even in the closed Tihar Jail sometime in 1993-94, when Vipassana meditation was introduced in a big way, which according to Tarsem Kumar, one of the Jail Superintendents of the Jail, brought about a radical change in the living and thinking of the prisoners, as narrated in his book titled "Freedom Behind Bars".

48. Open air prison, however, create their own problem which are basically of management. We are, however, sure that these problems are not such which cannot be sorted out. For the greater good of the society, which consists in seeing that the inmates of a jail come out, not as a hardened criminal but as a reformed person, no managerial problem is insurmountable. So, let more and more open air prisons be opened. To start with, this may be done at all the District Headquarters of the country.