What Tihar reads: Gandhi, Vivekananda, Vedas

NEWDELHI: Mahatma Gandhi is the most-read writer in the country’s biggest prison — the Tihar jail in Delhi.

His autobiography, My Experiments with Truth, is hard to find on the shelves of the libraries of Tihar that houses 14,000 prisoners. Entries in the library registers show that every week at least 10 inmates borrow the book that has been translated in at least 35 languages.

The Vedas and Swami Vivekananda’s books are most popular after My Experiments with Truth. “You will seldom see a copy of My Experiments with Truth in good condition. There will always be pages missing or numerous markings on the book,” said a former inmate who doubled up as a librarian till his release. “Everyone in prison reads it thinking it will change their life.”

And the fact that it was written by Gandhi when he was a prisoner himself — in Pune’s Yerwada jail — adds to its popularity. Gandhi talks about his childhood, his time in South Africa and England and the evolution of Satyagrah in the book.

To meet the demand, jail superintendents request NGOs to get the book for them. Each of Tihar’s eight jails has a library where prisons can read for four hours every day or take books to their cells using a library card. Tihar has a collection of around 100,000 books, which are donated by citizens, NGOs or are bought during book fairs at heavily discounted rates.

“We encourage prisoners to read so that they get inspired to take the right path in life. Many of them find solace in reading autobiographies of great men,” Sunil Gupta, who retired after serving as a law officer in the jail for 35 years, told HT.

› You will seldom see a copy of My Experiments with Truth in good condition. There will always be pages missing...

A FORMER INMATE AND LIBRARIAN AT TIHAR