Life is an intriguing thing, so much of which is often dictated by the whims of chance and fortune. Would I be the same person as I am, had I been born a thousand miles away in a different continent, wrapped and immersed in a different culture? Often, our experiences shape who we tend to become, but with no power to choose where we are born and raised, in what household, with what ideologies, in what economic levels; our experiences tend to find us as much as we find them.
It’s precisely why I’ve often restrained myself from casting judgment at most people, thinking long and hard about a quote from Plato on the need for compassion – “be kind, everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle than you”.
And it is this thought process which has often made me wonder about the people who find themselves unfortunate enough to land in prison. The whys and hows are always at the forefront, but I gather the courage to believe in hope – hope that a prison doesn’t remain a house of misery but rather a home for rehabilitation, and the bedrock on which foundations are laid for a second chance.
When contacted by a Journalist from “The Week” to photograph a group of inmates in Hyderabad, I was eager, filled with this hope, and I’m happy that I went and even more so to be able to recount for you my little journey.
The Chanchalaguda prison appears to be a place dedicated to not shunning the shunned but raising their dignity and trying their best to put them back upon their feet, so that they may once more walk their own path, and this time, make better choices.
While not allowed to visit the internal portion of the institution, we were shown three places that highlighted the practices and ideology of the prison wonderfully. The entrance was filled with plants and trees and was gorgeously green; by merely looking at the landscape, it would be hard to believe that this was, in fact, a jail.