Mentally unstable scar prison inmates: Nimhans

The Nimhans study on mental instability in prisoners revealed that mentally unstable prisoners often caused fear in other prisoners by their behaviour.

A teenager committed to the Chanchalguda Special Prison for Women on the charge of murder of her in-law used to wake up in the night and shout ‘Evil is there. It is trying to kill me. My in-law’s spirit is here and it wants to take revenge on me’.

Criminal psychologist and consulting psychiatrist Dr Poornima Nagaraja, who treated the teenager said that prisoners do reach such extreme conditions, especially teenage prisoners.

“Youngsters get angry soon with the circumstances inside prisons like loneliness, feelings of being isolated, away from society, loss of freedom etc,” she said.

A prisoner who has since been released from Cherlapalli Central Prison said that a rowdysheeter lodged in his block sometimes “took out his anger on me, stating that I was evil. He used to say that he had killed a person, whose spirit was trying to take revenge. After shutting down his goonda-giri, he used to visit Bidar Dargah and had been given a talisman to protect himself from evil. When he was lodged in prison, as per the rules, officials removed such things and he got very afraid.”

Dr Nagaraja says that mental instability is more frequently seen in under trailers more against life convicts. “First time offendings, depression, soft nature, murders committed with rage, addiction to alcohol/smoking and other factors are the causes behind such condition in prisoners.

Especially women prisoners, their children stay with them and whenever they ask questions about their father, grandparents, the women get depressed and loose control on their minds,” she said.

Apart from treatment, she said, “Life after prison will also lead to a cure soon. Once they get their freedom again, the possibilities of recovery are more,” she said.