PATTAM featured in Kungumam
The PATTAM program was featured in the popular Tamil weekly magazine, Kungumam. A gist of the article is given below.
There is a sub-jail for the young petty first-time offenders at Saidapet, Chennai. Last August, there were 143 inmates in this prison. What a surprise… that number has dropped to just 17 in March this year!
You may wonder if all the prisoners escaped by jumping over the wall! No. All thanks to PRISM, a Chennai-based NGO.
Ravikumar Paul, the founder of the organization and a Senior Advocate of the Madras High Court, began to speak enthusiastically.
Criminals with money can get away. But it is difficult for innocents without effort to get freed. Maybe even if we try for freedom, they will go out and talk in some desperation about what they are going to do. Two-week training camps were created for such innocent inmates in the prison itself. This training program was developed with the help of many psychologists and educators. It’s like group therapy. We gave them 6 steps of support such as individual counseling, group counseling, and teaching them life skills through sports.
At first, all the prisoners participated indifferently. But we diligently persisted as even 2 out of 10 is considered a success. On the last day of the program, we get the youngsters to address the class. The success of this training was that all those who raised their faces in the training spoke with dreams about their future.
We worked with the judges to reduce the power of remanding a criminal. We said that if an arrest is to be made, it can be done through a case and the court attached to it rather than through the police. This is why the number of young petty first-time offenders at Sub-Jail, Saidapet has decreased compared to last year.
We train the police to approach juvenile/young offenders under the auspices of the police under the PARAVAI Project. With this training we guide the released young offenders to avoid further crime in society and the same police will be vigilant.
Last year, the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister announced support for the implementation of this PARAVAI program across the state. All the credit for this goes not only to the ‘PRISM’ organization but also to the police prison authorities and the judiciary who worked on this project.
When all these projects are possible, incidents like the Nanguneri issue can be prevented…” says Ravikumar Paul with confidence.