Govt creates digitised records of inmates of correctional homes

Kolkata: State Correctional Administration and Correctional Services department has prepared a digitised version of personal details of the inmates from all the 59 correctional homes in the state.

Two new services will be introduced in a short period of time. They are visitors' management system in the correctional homes and also the hospital management system in which the administration can get to know all the information relating to the treatment of an inmate, what drugs he or she had been taking just by the clicking of a mouse. These personal details of the correctional home inmates would be extremely handy for the department.

A senior official of the department said that as a part of the implementation of the e-governance, they have made a digitised version of data of all inmates which gives a detailed case history and previous records of the inmates.

According to the official, the Detective Department of Kolkata police and other commissionerates and the Criminal Investigation Department may get these information of the inmates from the correctional administration department in connection with any case.

Ujjal Biswas, the minister-in-charge of the Correctional Administration and Correctional Services department said that following Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's instruction, his department had laid a great stress on prison reforms and an integrated prison management system has been developed. In 2014, the department has seen a major revamp.

It has also done a great deal of works for the reformation of prison behavior and streamlining the administrative structure for the better management of the prisons. The department has developed a software with the help of the NIC.

Two other projects namely visitors' management system (VMS), online approval of visitors, hospital management system of the prisoners have been started at Dum Dum Central Correctional Home.

The relatives of the inmates can apply for a visit to the prison by logging into the department website where they would be given an appointment. A mobile application will also be introduced where the visitors can also fix their time of visit.

An official of the department said that Bengal is the first state in the country to prepare a digitised version of personal records of around 24,000 inmates in the state.