Kolkata:
Children of convicts will now get an opportunity to study with the West Bengal Correctional Department deciding to open schools in jail premises.
The Alipore Correctional Home will be the first correctional home in the state to have a creche, a school and a library.
ADG (prison) Adhir Sharma said, “This is for the first time we are taking such an initiative and the Alipore Correctional Home has been chosen to be the first such facility where a creche, a school and a library will be set up”.
Sharma, who as the ADG (prison) took various steps for the overall development of the convicts lodged in different jails, said that there existed a rule under which children of women prisoners, aged between one and six, were allowed to stay with their mothers.
He further said that after age six, under the rule of law, these children either go back to their father or they are sent to schools-cum-homes run by the government and various NGOs.
According to a senior official of the Correctional Department, presently there are 25 six-year-old kids who are staying with their mothers in the Alipore Prison. The project is likely to be launched on May 12.
“Initially we will start the project with these 25 children. Later on, it will be spread to various other jails including the Dum Dum Central Jail, where at present 125 kids are staying with their mothers who are either convicts or are under trial,” Sharma said.
According to Alipore Jail sources, a store and a office in the jail premises would be converted to classrooms and creche. The children would be given uniform, bags, books, copies and pencils.
Sharma lauded renowned danseuse Alokananda Roy, who has been working for the last several years for the development of convicts and for helping the jail department set up schools and creches.
Staff of an NGO would serve as the teachers as some of the women convicts would act as supervisors of the creches, he said.
