New Delhi, July 14 -- Ministry of Home Affairs(MHA)has flagged radicalisation in prisons as an increasingly critical challenge and stressed the need for urgent steps to check the trend for maintaining public order and ensuring internal security. In a communication to all states and Union Territories, the MHA issued guidelines listing various steps, including screening of inmates, periodic risk assessment and segregation of high-risk individuals with greater surveillance, and underlined the importance of undertaking an exercise for de-radicalisation of such prisoners.
It said radicalisation can be typically dangerous in jails, as prisons are closed spaces where social isolation, group dynamics and lack of oversight can foster extreme points...