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OFFTRACK:
DELHI
 Jailhouse
Tuck
A
prison launches a brand for the savouries produced by its inmates
By
Methil Renuka
 |
| The
Tihar Jail baking factory will produce 4,000 packets of namkeen a
day |
Rumal
Sahai has finally got something to write home about. When he was given
a life term for murder five years ago, the 30-year-old youth felt that
he had reached a deadend. Will he ever regain acceptance in a society
that punished him? Who will take care of his children while he was serving
his term? And just how will he spend the seemingly endless nights locked
up in a cell in the Central Tihar Jail in Delhi?
The clouds of despair that enveloped Sahai and many other prisoners inside
the imposing walls of Asia's largest jail have now given way to a new
hope. For the past few months, Sahai has been counting biscuits instead
of bars. He is part of a team of 46 inmates that makes biscuits, bread
and cakes in the prison factory's Baking School. The job brings some respite
from the despondency behind bars. What's better is that he occasionally
even gets to send some of the products he makes to his children, along
with the pay cheque of about Rs 600 that the job fetches him every month.
Wiping the sweat from his brow with a gloved hand, he reasons, "At
least it keeps me busy and allows me to serve time more productively."
Keeping prisoners
productively occupied is the business of the jail authorities. At Tihar,
a business motive is helping them in this endeavour. Till now the prison
factory had catered to Tihar Jail's internal consumption. But on Gandhi
Jayanti last week, the Tihar authorities launched the TJ's Specials brand
of namkeens (savouries) in the open market in Delhi. Priced at Rs 10 for
an 80 gm pack, the glossy red and blue packets of potato wafers and aloo
bhujia will jostle for shelf space in retail outlets across the capital.
Inside the
Baking School in Tihar's Jail No. 2, prisoners are hard at work, working
three shifts seven days a week from four in the morning to past 9.30 at
night. The school is far from the sights and smells of prison. The aroma
of fruit cakes fresh from the oven and potato chips hot from the boiling
cauldron invite outsiders to premises they would normally avoid. Started
in 1994, the school has clocked an impressive growth, netting a turnover
of Rs 44.6 lakh last year. The profits were ploughed back into the Prisoners'
Welfare Fund and for the modernisation of units.
A 'Soaring
Dove': "Tihar Jail itself is a huge market for our products.
But wait till we have a formal presence in the market," beams Superintendent
of Prison B.S. Jaglan. The prison baking factory, which produces 1,100
loaves of bread a day, is now gearing up for a bigger slice of the namkeen
pie in Delhi. With the launch of the TJ's brand, it plans to produce about
4,000 packets of namkeen a day, helping the brand touch a turnover of
Rs 1 crore by next year.
After all,
carrying the success of the products beyond the four walls of the prison
should not be difficult. TJ's plans to start with a modest 100 kg of wafers
and 50 kg of aloo bhujia a day. Depending on the market response, production
capacity would be raised and other items like biscuits and cakes added
to the basket of offerings. "The products have passed the standards
set by the Prevention of Food Adulteration Department, and we have now
applied for FPO and trademark registration," says Jaglan.
The turnover
and profit projections apart, TJ's Specials logo—a soaring dove with
a stylised TJ trademark—is symbolic of the aspirations of the prisoners
and the motive of the authorities. The scheme would provide inmates an
opportunity to start life afresh once they leave jail. Former prisoners
can source TJ's products from Tihar and sell them in the open market.
Rajendar Singh, 42, from Uttar Pradesh, who will go home after 10 years
in jail this year, is planning to use his experience in prison to make
and sell potato chips under the TJ's brand name.
More importantly,
this will help keep the jail birds away from crime. Says factory superintendent
Subhash Sharma: "They will be gainfully employed." As a footnote
on the TJ's Specials namkeen packet says optimistically: "Help us
keep the city crime free".
Pratapsinh
may today live in a world of memories but his mental faculties are as
sharp as they ever were. He can still surprise with his ready wit and
gentle self-deprecating humour. Ask him, for example, what the difference
between kingship and democracy is. Pat comes the reply from a smiling
former ruler: "Kingship is a system in which one family exploits
millions while in a democracy thousands of families exploit the millions."
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