CHENNAI: Within the high walls of the central prison in Palayamkottai in southern Tamil Nadu , officials have been practising one of the worst forms of caste discrimination with impunity.Inquiries with former prisoners reveal that for more than a decade, the authorities have been segregating prisoners into different caste groups – thevars, nadars and dalits – and lodging them in different blocks, with remote chances of their mingling. Worse, warders call the prisoners by suffixing their caste identity to their names despite senior officials warning them against doing so on many an occasion.Forty-year-old Muniyappan (name changed), who served 7 years and six months in the Palayamkottai jail, said he had submitted several petitions to the authorities to stop the practice of calling prisoners by their caste names. “Caste names are heard often when visitors turn up to meet prisoners,” he said. Even while interacting with visitors, prison officials take precautions not to allow different caste groups to mingle.Four wards in the 138-year-old central prison are earmarked for the thevar community, two for dalits and one for nadars, udayars and other intermediate castes. Thevars have managed to get better facilities for years, thanks to some thevar officials occupying key posts in the prison over the years, said a former prisoner.The government, however, denies the prevalence of such caste discrimination in prisons. Law and prisons minister C Ve Shanmugam said, “Such practices are not there in any of the prisons in the state. I will still inquire.”Superintendent of Palayamkottai prison C Krishna Kumar also denied that there are caste-specific blocks in the prison. “Different caste groups are put together in the cells,” he claimed.Additional director general of police (prisons) Ashutosh Shukla told TOI the he would inquire into the issue and “take corrective measures” if it is found to be true.Prison officials, in private, admit that they segregate prisoners on caste basis to prevent outside enmity spilling into jails. It has been the practice since 1984, said an official. Tirunelveli and surrounding districts, for more than two decades, have been a hotbed of caste clashes. There has been protracted violence between these caste groups. Even the media has been accused of becoming insensitive to violence in the region. At the height of the caste clashes in 2005, a newspaper had carried a headline, “Today’s score is 7”, referring to the number of people killed on that day. “Keeping people from different caste groups together will lead to murders in prison,” said a retired superintendent of prisons.For instance, there were instances of stone pelting on thevars following the murder of dalit leader C Pasupathi Pandian in 2012. It didn’t slowball into a major clash though, but there is always simmering tension in the jail, said the retired official.Activists condemn the practice of housing prison inmates on the basis of caste divisions, saying it would not help reform them.Three years ago, the issue of segregation of prisoners on the basis of caste identity was dragged to the Madurai bench of the Madras high court. The then superintendent R Kanagaraj, who is at present DIG headquarters, filed an affidavit justifying the practice. He argued that there was threat to the lives of many inmates and hence people from different castes could not be lodged together. The case was finally dismissed.There is a provision to classify prisoners based on cultural identity and ethnicity. “In the case of the Palayamkottai prison, the prison authorities have classified inmates based on their caste as a preventive measure to avoid clashes,” said Beulah Emmanuel, professor of social work at the Academy of Prison and Correction Administration. She frequently visits all prisons in Tamil Nadu.K R Raja, who worked as a psychiatric counsellor for three years in the Palayamkottai prison, said division by castes was a bad practice. “Keeping them (thevars and dalits) apart is like encouraging caste feelings and hatred among them,” said Raja. It is an impediment for their reformation, he said. If caste feelings cannot be checked within the four walls of the prison, putting an end to caste clashes in society would remain a distant dream, he felt.

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