From prison walls to open skies: How women convicts rebuilt their life in Rajasthan’s open jail

Geeta Kesar, 43, stands surrounded by a lush garden where thermocol panels have been turned into planters and abandoned old kitchen utensils have been turned into planters. The flowers in his garden, a cramped office cubicle space, grow from seeds collected from city roads. There are roses and bougainvilleas, petunias and bird of paradise. Adjacent to his garden is a one-room tin-roofed house that has been his home for the past six years. While he is watering his plants and checking for pests, an independent dog peeks through the half-open door, growling loudly enough to attract Kesar’s attention but soft enough not to wake his five-year-old son, who is fast asleep inside the house.

For Kesar and all his neighbors, standing under the open sky, living with their families and interacting with the outside world was a privilege they earned after at least seven years of hard work. He and 374 others, mostly women, live in Shri Sampurnanand Khula Bandi Shivir, an open prison in Sanganer, Rajasthan. It is a gated community living facility with meeting and play area, located about 15 kilometers from Jaipur and named after a former Governor of the State.

“When we came here, most of us were stunned for the first time,” he says, recalling the first time he looked at the open sky from his room in Sanganer. “I cried uncontrollably but all kinds of thoughts were running through my mind. This is a second chance for me, yes, but how will I survive here, how will I make a living, how will I do this alone,” Kesar asked himself.

In Rajasthan, the state with the highest number of open prisons in India, a convict who has served at least 6 years and 8 months and demonstrates “good behavior” in closed prison complexes is given the opportunity to move to an open-air prison, provided that he is not a rape convict. People have to submit a petition and it is then reviewed.

“When I first came here, I was intimidated by the idea that I would have to support myself and pay my own rent. I had no family members, friends or acquaintances to lend a helping hand,” Kesar recalls. Gradually, he moved out of the complex’s walls to look for work, first with his roommate, then alone. “I was wondering who would give me a job and why they would trust me,” he says. Without any skill training, Kesar managed to get a sewing job for ₹6,000 a month.

Also read: Open prisons provide freedom for prisoners in RajasthanOpen

“When I first went out looking for a job, I didn’t know where to apply. People in surrounding offices and factories were rejecting me when they saw the address of Sanganer open prison on my Aadhaar card,” says Kesar. Integration with the outside world remains challenging.

Switzerland pioneered the idea in the late 19th century. The International Journal of Legal Administration and Humanities noted in a 2023 article that the first open prison in India was in the Bombay Presidency in 1905. Later, in 1949, a fully functional system was started in Lucknow. Britain got its first in the 1930s.

The United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, held in Geneva in 1955, defined open institutions as institutions that lack “physical measures against escape” (walls, locks, bars, armed guards) and are managed “by a system based on self-discipline and the prisoner’s sense of responsibility to the group in which he lives.”

journey of change

“When I was convicted 12 years ago, all my family members cut ties with me. The only person who came to visit me every six months was my aging mother,” says Kesar. While his family abandoned him, the prison warden, where Kesar had learned to read and write, was his only hope of petitioning for transfer to an open institution.

Geeta Kesar is in the open prison in Sanganer. | Photo Credit: SHASHI SHEKHAR KASHYAP

More than a decade ago, Kesar was convicted of murdering her husband. He explains that his brother, who filed a complaint with the police, later persuaded his older daughter to testify against him in court. “I told my parents many times that my husband would tie me up, beat me, and rape me every night, but they refused to take me back, citing social reaction,” she says, looking away and playing with the bracelets on her arms. “But one day, I couldn’t take it anymore,” says Kesar, who still avoids eye contact after a long time.

For most women in Sanganer, the road to open prison was a bumpy ride. Sarita Devi (name changed), 35, was convicted of poisoning her infant son and newborn daughter nine years ago. He had no family members or friends to petition on his behalf. “When I gave poison to my children, I drank it with them, but in a cruel game played by the gods, they died and I continued to live,” says Devi.

Devi, who is originally from Bhopal, says her husband has been harassing her for years. After the incident, his wife and family left him. “During the seven years I spent behind bars, no one came to meet me and I was illiterate,” he says, adding that he was later informed about open prisons by prison officials who helped him submit his petition.

Criminologist Smita Chakraburtty says women struggle the most in the criminal justice system. “Many of the women are abandoned by their families at the start of their trials. Many are illiterate and have no one to interpret the law and help them understand their rights. Many also struggle to get good lawyers to represent them,” said Chakraburtty, director of Paar – Prison Aid + Action Research, a non-profit organization that advocates for open prisons.

second chance

The first day in Sanganer was filled with intense emotions for 30-year-old Rekha Yadav (name changed), who was convicted along with her lover for the murder of her husband. “I hadn’t seen my partner for seven years, so when I saw him for the first time we both cried,” she says. On the same day, Rekha and her partner went to a few castles in Jaipur. They tried hailing a taxi around 6pm, when they were expected to return to Sanganer prison, but were caught off guard by the taxi drivers’ questions. “At first, most people refused to give us a ride. When someone finally agreed, they started asking us questions about what we were doing that would send us to prison,” he says.

“Although the past continues to follow us, this is a new chapter for us,” he says, adding that his partner now earns money driving an electric rickshaw and he works in a fabric factory.

For 55-year-old Saheeda Banu, Sanganer open prison brought her the joy of being reunited with her family after seven long years, but it was not without its shortcomings. Banu, who hails from Kota in Rajasthan, is serving time after she was named as the instigator of her daughter-in-law’s death.

Stating that society has punished her many times, Banu says, “Whether I really played a role in his death is a matter between me and God, but even if we act according to the law, a person should only be punished once for the crime, but this is rarely the case.” He is trying to get his daughter married, but the families of the prospective grooms back out when they find out where the family of five lives.

Hemraj Vaishnav is the guard of Sanganer. He says that female convicts are only transported to open prisons in teams of two. They are allocated a room to share, but if one of the women has a family, the family is allocated a separate room.

Vaishnav, who was previously in Jaipur Central Jail, says his approach to justice has changed. “After being here, I realized it’s not about punishment, it’s about correcting the course of life,” he says, adding that the focus here helps people look forward rather than backward.

find relatives

When Devi’s application for transfer to an open prison was accepted, she was allocated a room with Saros, who was slightly older than her. “Initially, the idea of ​​an open prison was liberating, but when they told us we had to earn a living and pay rent, I was worried about how I would handle all this,” says Devi. Saros would reassure him.

“He accompanied me when I was applying for a job at a factory, walked almost 2 kilometers to meet me outside of work on my first day, and on my bad days he would come and feed me,” he recalls.

Abandoned by her family, Devi, like most women in Sanganer, found love in Saros. “I have never experienced this much love from a woman before, so when Saros left prison earlier this year, I was really happy for him, but at the same time, I was sad to lose my true friend,” Devi adds, showing a photo of two women standing outside the Hawa Mahal.

Many women also meet their husbands in prison. Priyanka Seth (name changed), 34, and her partner were accused of luring people on dating apps and murdering a man in Jaipur. When they went to the open prison, they tried to be with each other but failed. Now she is married to another man.

Seth says many women in Sanganer also marry to survive. “The world both outside and inside the prison belongs to men, so women tend to get married here to ensure you have a peaceful life,” says Seth.

Land and future plans

As women made strategic choices to survive and embrace life in Sanganer, a legal battle raged outside the five-foot-high walls of the open prison. On July 30, 2024, the Deputy Commissioner of Jaipur Development Authority (JDA) issued an allocation letter for expansion of a satellite hospital. Of the total area of ​​30 thousand 400 square meters allocated to the open prison, 21 thousand 948 square meters were allocated to unused land.

Later, activists filed a contempt petition with the Supreme Court. The bench, comprising Chief Justice of India Bhushan R. Gavai and Justice K. V. Vishwanathan, directed that part of the land be used to build new prison structures and reduced the portion allocated to the proposed hospital.

Kesar, who was also the elected president of the prison panchayat, was also relieved. “Sanganer jail is at a strategic location, surrounded by fabric mills, construction sites, design centers and residential complexes, where people with various skills can find jobs. If we had moved to the outskirts of the city, people would have struggled to find jobs within our timings (6 am to 6 pm),” he says.

Women and men work in fabric factories and construction sites; Some work as drivers in schools or drive e-rickshaws, allowing them to gradually integrate into society. “I have met so many people here who bring the promise of a better tomorrow and treat us like humans, not criminals,” says Kesar.

She’s in contact with nonprofits that work with women in abusive marriages and has a plan for life after prison. “I want to tell them that they can find a way out without resorting to anything extreme. I look forward to working on this when I finish serving my sentence by mid-2026,” he says with a smile.

alisha.d@thehindu.co.in

Edited by Sunalini Mathew.