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After hosting real prisoners for over 200 years, the District Central Jail at Sangareddy in Telangana will now provide tourists an opportunity to experience prison life. As part of the
Prison Department’s ‘Feel the Jail’ initiative, tourists can stay in the jail for a period of 24 hours by paying a fee of Rs 500. The ‘inmates’ will be provided with a jail uniform, bedding,
a steel plate for meals, along with other facilities prescribed in the prison manual. Meals and refreshments will be on the house as well, according to the prison menu.
During their stay, the ‘inmates’ will have to clean their barracks and during their free time, will be allowed to plant saplings.
The District Central Jail, which was constructed in 1796 during the rule of the Nizam of Hyderabad, served as a prison for 212 years until 2012. Since then, the jail has been converted into
a museum and the Prison Department hopes that the new initiative will help in boosting its popularity among tourists. However, no tourists have opted to ‘Feel the Jail’ so far.
The Sangareddy jail is by no means alone in offering tourists an experience of life in jail. It now joins the legendary Alcatraz prison in San Francisco, United States, the Robben Island
jail in South Africa (where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned) and the Hoa Lo prison in Vietnam (where American prisoners of war were held during the Vietnam War) as jails where tourists can
stay overnight.