For Vimla Mehra, running one of the world’s largest prison complexes is like managing a big household.
“Women can do it better, because it’s just an application of natural work that we do at home,” Ms. Mehra told INN on a recent afternoon interview.
The 57-year-old divorced mother is the second female director general of Delhi’s Tihar Prison, which has 12,000 inmates — 540 of them women — kept in 10 jails.
Kiran Bedi, the first woman to head the prison, stood down in 1995 after two years in the role. Ms. Mehra took over in August last year.
Since then, Tihar, already home to some of India’s most notorious prisoners, has housed the suspects in the Delhi gang rape case that led to the death of a 23-year-old woman in December, prompting protest and outrage across the world.
A “motherly instinct” helps her interact with prisoners on an emotional level, but also made it difficult for her to be associated with suspects accused of such brutality, Ms. Mehra said.
“I was really distressed by what had happened to the young woman,” she said. “I was connected with the case because the suspects are with me [in Tihar] and it was very disturbing mentally.”
As director general, her duty of care is to the prisoners.
“We have to keep them properly so that no body hurts them, which every other inmate wanted to do,” she added.
In March, Ram Singh, one of the accused in that case, killed himself in his cell in Tihar, according to prison authorities.
His death, which is under investigation by a judicial magistrate, raised questions about the protection offered to inmates and why he was not monitored more closely.
Ms. Mehra says there was no reason to place him under special observation because he was in a cell with two others and not deemed suicidal.
“He was happy, he had good food, he played badminton and at night he decides to do something like that,” she said.
Friday, a Tihar prisoner, named by a jail spokesman as Mohammed Shadab, was allegedly killed during a fight in the jail.
Ms. Mehra told local media that it was a “group fight” and there would be a judicial inquiry into the death.
Ms. Mehra joined the police force in 1978 aged 22. She was the only woman in her batch of 58 recruits. She says she “couldn’t climb the ropes” in physical training in the gym, but was able to do everything else her male counterparts did.
Her motivation for joining the police was to be able to support herself. “I wanted to be financially independent and prove that I was capable of doing something special,” she said.
Ms. Mehra, the middle child of seven children, says she was allowed to study instead of help with the household chores.
“There was a lot of work to do at home but I was never forced to do that,” she said. “My father created an atmosphere for all of us — but particularly me — to study and he spotted my potential,” she said.
Ms. Mehra’s mother died shortly after her birth and she grew up with a step mother and her father.
After joining the police as an assistant superintendent (a middle ranking officer) having passed India’s tough civil service exam, she was posted to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands off India’s east coast. Her first big murder case involved investigating the death of a man who had been shot through the head with an arrow.
She returned to Delhi in 1984 just as anti-Sikh riots were raging in the city.
“That was the first big professional experience of my life, commanding a battalion,” she said. “People were so violent.”
Her battalion was in charge of dealing with dead bodies. More than 3,000 people are believed to have been killed in rioting in retaliation for the assassination of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh body guards.
Ms. Mehra’s next posting was to the crimes against women cell, where she began the first self-defense training course for women run by the police.
“We have hands and fingers which we can use if we are healthy to push the person away,” Ms. Mehra said. “We can use a scarf or a pen whatever we have. We encouraged women to try and think about using them, we have so much weaponry on our person.”
Ms. Mehra says she hasn’t experienced discrimination as a woman at her level of the profession. But she acknowledges this isn’t the case lower down.
“Female constables don’t get that respect and support from male colleagues,” she said.
“You have to work extra hard to prove your capability. People feel that a woman won’t be able to do it so we have to prove ourselves,” she added.
But the situation for women at all levels is improving in India, according to Ms. Mehra.
“We see women at the top now they are leaving their mark… they are aiming at higher positions and changing the mind of society,” she said.
If attitudes are changing why should an aspiring young woman, like the victim of the Delhi gang rape in December, face such brutality on her way home from the cinema with her male companion at 9 p.m. in the evening?
“The men have not been able to match that change [in the position of women],” Ms. Mehra said.
“There is hostility in low and middle classes about the progress that women have made. They would still prefer to treat them as sexual subjects and not give them respect.”
But she adds that this is “just one section of society” and things will improve.
“My generation are the beginners, it will be easier for next generations of women to be accepted straight away,” she said. “People were very conservative as far as we were concerned but with a lot of effort and commitment people have come to accept that we are equal, or maybe better.”
No comments:
Post a Comment