THRISSUR: It was in July 2025 that Soumya rape and murder case convict Govindachamy escaped from Kannur prison, triggering shock and panic across the state.
After a manhunt lasting hours, police managed to apprehend him from an unused open well, a few kilometres from the central prison. Taking lessons from such incidents, the prisons department has come up with a project that will employ technology for prison security and surveillance.
A back-of-the-envelope count suggests that in the last five years, close to 70 prisoners have escaped jails in the state. While most of the getaways have been during trips to courts or medical consultations, prison breaks have also been reported.
On Friday, Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala inaugurated a drone-surveillance system at Viyyur Central Prison and Correctional Home.
The technology, the first of its kind in the state, will help detect jailbreaks, attempts to smuggle in prohibited items, and illegal activities occurring over prison walls or under the cover of trees, Chennithala said at the launch. “Drones will enable immediate responses in such situations. The initiative aims to enhance prison security and discipline by integrating advanced technology with existing human resources.”
Spread across 139 acres, the Viyyur complex houses the central prison, high-security prison, women’s prison, district jail, and sub-jail. “The complex accommodates 1,700 to 2,000 inmates.
The absence of boundary walls in certain areas, dense tree cover, and limited manpower poses challenges to security surveillance. It is during such situations drone surveillance becomes important,” a Viyyur prison official told TNIE.
The facility has also launched an artificial intelligence-based CCTV analytics system that can identify suspicious movements, unusual incidents, and potential security threats and instantly alert prison officials.
Following the completion of a trial, which has been termed as a major step in the modernisation of Kerala’s prison system, the department is set to examine the possibility of implementing similar technologies in other prisons across the state in phases. The drone-surveillance trial was conducted under the Federation of Aerospace Engineers and Robotics Innovations (FAERI), a charitable trust that advances aerospace engineering, robotics and innovation in the country.
The prison sector remains one of the areas where advanced technology has seen relatively limited application. The government’s objective is to transform the complex into one of India’s safest prisons using state-of-the-art technology.