THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Following an increase in wages for prisoners engaged in jail chores, the state government will implement its 2024 order mandating deduction of 30 per cent of the remuneration of the inmates as part of the Victim Compensation Scheme. The amount deducted will be spent on compensating the victims of crimes.
The state government in November 2024 had ordered remitting one-third of prisoners’ earnings from jail chores to the Victim Relief Fund and asked the prisons department to comply with the directive by January 2025.
However, the order was kept in abeyance after the prison department responded that the inmates were getting paltry wages and deducting one-third of that would cause a crisis. The department also had suggested that the order be implemented after the government revises the prison wages.
The state government on January 9 increased the wages of the inmates by about 140%, making it conducive to implement the order. As per the new revision, inmates engaged in menial jobs have been classified into three groups: skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled. The skilled workers will get Rs 620 per day, while the semi-skilled and the unskilled will earn Rs 560 and Rs 530, respectively.
The wages of the inmates were last revised in 2018. The wages of prisoners ranged from Rs 63 to Rs 168 per day in central jails, while inmates of open jails earned up to Rs 230 a day. Half the total earnings is earmarked as ‘family portion’, which is meant to address the needs of their families. The rest goes towards their rehabilitation and canteen purchases.
Prison department sources said the condition appeared to be ripe to implement the 2024 order as wages have been raised and brought at par with many other states. “In 2024, the inmates under apprenticeship earned a meagre Rs 63. If one-third amount was deducted from them, they would have got Rs 21.
Most of the families of the inmates depend on the wages earned by the inmates for their survival and it would have been inhumane had the government went ahead with its plan. The government acknowledged the issue and froze the order. Now that the wages are hiked, there should not be any issue in executing the order,” said a source.
There are around 10,000 prisoners in the state of which about 4000 are engaged in jail chores. The amount deducted from their wages will be moved to an exclusive head of account.