In The Isolation of the Anda Ward, We Dared To Sing, Writes Gautam Navlakha, Bhima Koregaon Accused

‘‘Those who speak of humanity in this system

Are thrown into prison to acquaint them

With the vocabulary of ‘criminology’’’

—Varavara Rao, Schools and Prisons

Hope and despair are basic human emotions and I believe that all human beings, now and then, swing between these two ends of the spectrum in life. I experienced these emotions acutely during my time in prison and captivity. I remember swinging between these two states of being every now and then. I experienced despair at the rejection of my bail plea in court, or the lack of any progress in my Discharge (of charges) application and also at the sheer length of the legal process, or for having to turn to the custodian court to win relief for the most mundane and profound necessities.

In prison, in contrast to life outside, there are far too many moments which can trigger a mood swing among prisoners. This is because the jail system is geared to punish prisoners, be they convicts or undertrials, whose custodians, paradoxically, are the court and the jail authorities.

Imposing their writ on prisoners is considered the fundamental task of a jailor. But there was polite conversation, arguments and even angry exchanges between the prisoners and the jail authorities regarding these. But I also learnt how to get around such restrictions. We broke jail rules that prohibited us from singing, talking loudly or even laughing. In the physical isolation of the Anda ward, we dared to sing, spoke to each other across yards and laughed, and had conversations. We found ways to meet each other face-to-face and to communicate. Some rules, I believe, are meant to be broken. And this helped ease a lot of the pain I experienced under imprisonment.

Jail life revolved around matters to do with the most basic necessities within the prison: food, water, and medical help, followed by a long list of deprivations—education, access to the library, receiving and sharing books and recreation in open spaces. We were confronted with and fought against the censorship of our letters and articles without our knowledge, sharing of our personal and legal correspondence with agencies in violation of law and rules, and to receiving clothes, stationary, stamps, etc. from the family.

Each of these issues involved a struggle because in prison, no request, however basic, is accepted instantly. It begins with a refusal and then prisoners have to persist with their request before it is accepted or turn to the custodian court for redressal. During this waiting period, frustration and irritation at the slow pace of the entire process of lodging a request to it being heard, the knee-jerk rejection of the court, affected me emotionally. The two issues that affect a prisoner the most, I feel, are the delays in the legal process and the prisoner’s fight to receive proper medical assistance. Other issues are important but they do not drive a person to as much despair. I realised that the more intense the sense of despair, the harder the hope kicks in.

For me, the most distressing moment during the entirety of my incarceration was the 28 days I spent in quarantine when I was suddenly brought to Mumbai from Tihar Jail in Delhi within less than two months of my arrest in April 2020.

During the pandemic, ostensibly to avoid over-crowding, new prisoners who arrived at Taloja Jail Gate were directed to go to a school in the nearby township called Khargar, where one wing of the Gokhale School was turned into a jail quarantine. When I was brought here, it already had around 300 inmates crowded into seven classrooms converted into barracks. By the time I left, the inmate population had reached 400.

—Mumbai January, 17, 2026

(This article is part of the Magazine issue titled Thou Shalt Not Dissent dated February 1, 2026, on political prisoners facing long trials and the curbing of their rights under anti-terrorism laws for voicing their dissent)