DIGITAL INDIA STOPS AT THE PRISON GATE

 From UPI at tea stalls to paper coupons behind the bars: 

Why India’s digital transformation must travel all the way to the barrack floor.

By Saurabh Thakore
Author of The Other Prison and Prison Break Without Escape

Author’s Note

This essay is based on my personal experiences, observations and understanding during a limited period of incarceration. It is not intended as an allegation against any individual officer, prison authority, institution, government or policymaker, nor should my observations be assumed to represent every prison or every prisoner’s experience.

Some references concern informal practices, conversations and terminology that I personally encountered or heard but cannot independently verify. They are presented not as findings of an investigation, but as observations and questions for constructive discussion about technological modernisation, transparency and correctional reform.

India has already taken important steps toward prison digitisation. The Ministry of Home Affairs supports technology-driven prison projects, while the e-Prisons platform is designed to computerise and integrate prison and prisoner-management activities. The government's own prison-reform framework also recognises scientific and technological interventions, education, vocational training, rehabilitation and reintegration.

My question is therefore not whether technology exists in Indian prisons. It is much narrower:

How far has Digital India travelled from the prison administration office to the everyday life of the prisoner sitting on the barrack floor?

Digital India Outside

India’s digital transformation is visible almost everywhere. A vegetable vendor accepts payment through a QR code. A roadside tea seller receives ₹20 through UPI and immediately has a record of the transaction. Railway tickets are booked on a phone, bank balances can be checked in seconds, bills are paid online, government documents can be accessed digitally, money moves without physical cash, and families separated by thousands of kilometres can see one another through video calls.

Perhaps the greatest achievement of Digital India is not simply that sophisticated technology exists, but that sophisticated technology has reached ordinary people. It has travelled beyond corporate offices and metropolitan cities to villages, small shops, taxis, street vendors and ordinary households.

Then I went to prison.

Behind the prison gate, I encountered a very different technological reality. Cash was restricted, yet paper coupons carried purchasing value. Registers remained important for recording everyday activities. Prisoner counts were physically conducted. Telephone-related information could be maintained manually. Much of the prisoner’s everyday interaction with the institution appeared considerably more dependent on paper and manual processes than the world immediately outside the gate.

As a prisoner, I did not have a personal digital interface through which I could independently see the money officially available for my use, every authorised deduction, my purchase history, communication information, scheduled Mulakat, requests or other everyday institutional records. The contrast stayed with me: outside the gate was Digital India; inside the barrack, I was holding paper.

Digitising a Prison Is Not the Same as Digitising Prison Life

India is certainly not beginning from zero. Technology, computerised prison records, CCTV, biometrics and digital prison-management initiatives already exist, and these developments deserve recognition. The question is whether we distinguish between two different forms of digitisation: digitising the administration of a prison and digitising those parts of prison life where technology can directly improve transparency, accountability and rehabilitation.

A prison officer replacing a paper register with a computer represents administrative digitisation. A prisoner being able to securely verify his authorised financial balance, understand every deduction, access educational material, make a properly recorded communication request or receive a traceable acknowledgement of a grievance represents something more. That is digitisation travelling from the administrative office to the barrack floor.

Nowhere did I feel this distinction more strongly than when I encountered the paper coupon.

The Paper Coupon in the Age of UPI

Cash was restricted in the prison environment I experienced, but purchasing power had not disappeared. It had taken another physical form: the paper coupon. I remember holding those coupons. They were small pieces of paper, softened through handling, their edges showing the effects of circulation. Officially, they served authorised purchasing purposes, but I kept wondering why, in the age of UPI and digital financial records, transferable paper value was still necessary.

Outside prison, one of the great advantages of digital payment is not merely convenience; it is traceability. If I pay ₹500 digitally, the transaction normally creates a record. We can establish that ₹500 moved, when it moved and where it went. Paper bearer-like value behaves differently because it can physically change hands, and once it does, the transaction may no longer leave the same reliable trail.

That creates a much larger issue than whether paper is technologically outdated. It creates the possibility of a secondary coupon economy operating beyond the visibility of the original authorised transaction.

The Black-Coupon Economy

The greatest concern with a transferable coupon system, in my view, begins when the official transaction ends but the physical life of the coupon does not. Consider a simplified example. Suppose a prisoner’s family sends ₹4,000 through the authorised Money Order mechanism. The receipt of ₹4,000 is officially recorded, the corresponding purchasing value becomes available to the prisoner, and the prisoner subsequently purchases ₹4,000 worth of authorised goods. From the perspective of the original accounting process, the transaction may appear complete: ₹4,000 came in, and ₹4,000 worth of authorised purchasing value was used.

But what happens if the physical coupons remain capable of circulating after that authorised transaction rather than being permanently cancelled or extinguished? The official journey of the ₹4,000 may have ended, while the economic journey of the coupon may continue.

This is what I describe as the black-coupon problem. The concern is not necessarily the original authorised issue of the coupon; the concern is its possible subsequent circulation outside a transparent accounting trail. During incarceration, I encountered conversations and situations in which coupons were associated with informal exchanges, favours, obligations and allegedly prohibited items such as maal, ganja, charas, bidi and tobacco. I also heard allegations involving payments, benefits or favours to influential prisoners and others within the prison environment.

I cannot independently verify every such transaction, identify its participants or responsibly attribute wrongdoing to any particular prisoner, employee or officer. I therefore do not present those allegations as facts. But the technological vulnerability does not depend upon proving every alleged transaction. If a transferable instrument has purchasing value and can change hands repeatedly without each transfer being recorded, an invisible secondary economy becomes possible.

How ₹4,000 Can Generate Lakhs in Cumulative Transactional Turnover

The arithmetic illustrates why this matters, but it needs to be understood correctly. Suppose the same ₹4,000 worth of coupon value moves from Prisoner A to Prisoner B in an informal transaction. B later gives the same value to C, C passes it to D, and the process continues. The coupon has not magically created additional money; there is still only ₹4,000 of underlying purchasing value. What increases is the cumulative transactional turnover generated by repeated circulation.

If ₹4,000 of coupon value changes hands 10 times, it facilitates ₹40,000 of cumulative exchanges. If it changes hands 25 times, the turnover becomes ₹1 lakh. At 50 circulations, the cumulative turnover becomes ₹2 lakh, and at 100 circulations, the same ₹4,000 of underlying value could facilitate ₹4 lakh worth of exchanges.

Time makes the illustration even more significant. If ₹4,000 of coupon value remained usable for a lengthy period and circulated only twice per week for 50 weeks, the cumulative value of those exchanges would be ₹4 lakh. If it circulated five times per week for 50 weeks, the cumulative transactional turnover would reach ₹10 lakh.

The effect becomes even larger when considered across a population. As a purely statistical illustration, if 100 prisoners each had ₹4,000 of transferable coupon value and each ₹4,000 batch circulated an average of 20 times, ₹4 lakh of underlying coupon value could facilitate ₹80 lakh of cumulative transactions. If 500 batches of ₹4,000 circulated 50 times, ₹20 lakh of underlying value could facilitate ₹10 crore of cumulative transactional turnover.

These figures are illustrations, not estimates of actual turnover in any particular prison. ₹10 crore in cumulative turnover does not mean ₹10 crore entered the prison, that anybody earned ₹10 crore, or that the government lost ₹10 crore. It simply demonstrates the velocity effect created when the same bearer-like value is capable of being exchanged repeatedly. I do not possess transaction-level data from which the actual volume of secondary coupon circulation could responsibly be calculated. In fact, that inability to calculate it is itself part of the technological concern: if every transfer is not recorded, nobody can reliably know how many times the coupon changes hands or what economic activity it facilitates.

The Account Closes, but the Coupon May Continue

This is the central weakness of the system as I experienced and understood it. The official records may establish where the original ₹4,000 entered, when purchasing value was issued and what authorised goods were purchased. From the formal accounting perspective, the transaction may therefore be reconciled. But if the physical coupon subsequently moves between prisoners, the official system may have no corresponding record of who holds it, why it was transferred, what was received in exchange or how many times it has subsequently circulated.

The accounting system may record the birth of the value and perhaps its first authorised use, while remaining unable to see its subsequent life. By the tenth, fiftieth or hundredth exchange, the same paper may have facilitated a chain of transactions for which no equivalent official transaction history exists.

That is why I believe this is fundamentally a Digital India question. If cash is restricted inside prison to control and account for economic activity, replacing cash with another transferable instrument does not necessarily solve the underlying problem. A coupon used once for an authorised purchase is simply a purchasing instrument. A coupon capable of repeatedly passing from hand to hand can begin to perform a cash-like function.

The technological answer is therefore not better paper. It is to make authorised prison purchasing value digital, personal, non-transferable and extinguishable at the point of expenditure.

Replace the Coupon with a Closed Digital Prison Wallet

Imagine a secure internal digital account for every prisoner. This would not mean giving prisoners smartphones, unrestricted UPI, internet banking or open access to the internet. Prison is a controlled environment and must remain one. The digital wallet could exist entirely within the correctional institution and operate only through authorised kiosks, biometric verification or other secure institutional systems.

Suppose ₹4,000 is officially credited to Prisoner A. His secure account shows an available balance of ₹4,000. He purchases authorised canteen goods worth ₹350. The system records his identity, the date, the authorised point of sale, the items purchased and the amount deducted, and his balance automatically becomes ₹3,650.

The critical difference is that the ₹350 does not emerge from the transaction as another transferable piece of purchasing value. It is extinguished from Prisoner A’s balance at the point of expenditure. Prisoner B cannot pick up the spent value and use it again. Prisoner A cannot casually hand his remaining digital balance to another prisoner unless a specific, authorised transfer mechanism exists under prison rules. Every rupee therefore has an identifiable beginning, a permitted purpose and an auditable end.

₹4,000 enters, ₹4,000 is recorded, and every authorised rupee spent leaves a trace. Once spent, that purchasing value cannot continue circulating invisibly around the barrack.

This is not merely replacing paper with a screen. It is using technology to remove the structural weakness created by transferable bearer-like value.

From Registers to Auditable Digital Records

The same principle could apply to many everyday prison systems. Physical registers have served institutions for generations and may continue to have value as backup or legally required records, but structured digital systems make searching, comparing, auditing and identifying patterns considerably easier.

Telephone access provides a simple example. Approved telephone numbers could be digitally registered against a prisoner’s identity. Access could be authenticated, while the date, duration and approved recipient of a call could be recorded automatically. Permitted frequency and duration could be managed according to applicable prison rules. The purpose would not be unrestricted communication; it would be controlled communication supported by a reliable audit trail.

Family meetings, or Mulakat, could similarly benefit from thoughtful digitisation. Digital appointment scheduling could reduce uncertainty and congestion. Visitors could receive confirmed time slots, prisoners could be notified through an internal system, and visitor authentication could be linked securely to the appointment process. Where legally permitted and operationally appropriate, secure video-Mulakat facilities could supplement physical meetings, particularly for families living far away.

Technology does not have to reduce human connection. Properly designed, it can make legitimate human connection easier to administer, more accessible and more transparent.

Technology Can Support Physical Prison Administration

Technology can also strengthen traditional security procedures without replacing them. Every morning and evening, the routine I experienced came Rolling. The call “Jodi-jodi beso!” brought prisoners into pairs while officers physically counted them until the number matched the register.

I would not suggest replacing that physical count entirely with technology. An officer visually confirming the presence and condition of prisoners has security and human value that a machine cannot completely reproduce. But biometric verification, RFID or another secure identification system could provide a parallel confirmation layer. If the physical count and secure electronic record did not match, the discrepancy could be immediately flagged.

The same principle could apply to Vaaro, the rotation of routine barrack duties. A simple digital roster could record who was assigned a duty, when it was performed and whether repeated substitutions or exemptions occurred. What appears to be a small administrative reform can create useful institutional data over time. Patterns that disappear in handwritten registers or human memory become easier to identify when information is structured.

The principle should remain consistent throughout prison modernisation: technology should assist responsible officers, not replace their judgement.

A Digital Grievance Trail

One of the most valuable applications of technology could be prisoner grievances. A complaint inside prison is different from a complaint outside because the complainant cannot simply leave the environment after reporting the problem. If a prisoner reports intimidation, mistreatment or another serious concern, he may continue living in the same physical environment after making the complaint.

A secure digital grievance mechanism could therefore record when a complaint was submitted, provide a confidential acknowledgement number, show its status and document where it was routed. For serious complaints, appropriate system rules could require preservation of relevant records or CCTV footage before routine overwriting, subject to legal, privacy and security safeguards.

Technology should never automatically decide whether a prisoner’s allegation is true. Investigation, judgement and appropriate action must remain human responsibilities. What technology can establish is something more basic but extremely important: that the prisoner complained, when he complained, where the complaint went and what happened to it afterwards.

Technology Should Be a Witness, Not Another Jailer

This, to me, should be the philosophy behind prison digitisation. Artificial intelligence and automated systems should not determine guilt, punishment or a prisoner’s credibility. Technology should not become another jailer or merely another instrument for watching prisoners more closely.

Its strongest role is to become a reliable witness. It can establish that ₹4,000 entered an account and where it was legitimately spent. It can preserve the history of an authorised purchase, record a permitted telephone call, document a scheduled Mulakat, register a medical request or preserve the chronology of a grievance. Human beings must still interpret circumstances, investigate allegations, exercise discretion and make decisions, but the underlying institutional trail becomes harder to lose, forget or misunderstand.

That is one of the simplest but most powerful things a secure digital system can do: it remembers.

Digital India Must Also Educate the Prisoner

There is another side to prison digitisation that deserves equal attention. We should not ask only how technology can manage a prisoner; we should also ask how technology can educate him.

A prisoner may spend months or years separated from a society whose technological environment changes extraordinarily quickly. In India, QR payments, UPI, online banking, government portals, digital documents, email, online employment platforms, video communication and smartphone-based services have become part of ordinary life in a remarkably short period.

A person who spends several years inside prison may therefore return to a society technologically different from the one he left. If a Sudhara Gruh is genuinely intended to prepare a person for lawful life outside, digital literacy can no longer be treated as an optional extra. It has become part of rehabilitation.

A Digital Classroom Behind the Gate

Digital education does not require unrestricted internet access. Correctional institutions could create secure offline or heavily restricted learning environments where prisoners learn practical digital skills without compromising institutional security.

Basic programmes could teach prisoners how to use a keyboard and computer, create a document, work with a simple spreadsheet, write a professional email, prepare a digital résumé and complete an online-style form. Financial digital literacy could explain how UPI and online banking work, how OTPs should be protected, how QR-code scams operate, how phishing attempts can be recognised and how digital identity should be used safely.

Prisoners approaching release could also learn how government digital services work, how online employment applications are completed and how legitimate job portals are used. Depending upon aptitude, security classification and available infrastructure, more advanced programmes could provide training in office software, accounting applications, data entry, graphic design, digital marketing, programming fundamentals or other employable technological skills.

The objective should not merely be to distribute certificates showing that a course was attended. The objective should be capability—the ability to use technology safely and productively after release.

Digital Preparation Before Release

A structured digital-readiness programme could become particularly valuable during the months before release. Instead of assuming that a prisoner understands the technological world waiting outside, the correctional institution could assess whether he can use a computer, understand digital payments, protect an OTP, recognise an online scam, prepare a résumé, write an email, complete an online job application and navigate basic government and banking services.

For somebody who has spent years away from rapidly changing technology, these are not trivial skills. A person may leave prison legally free but technologically excluded from the society into which he has returned. Preparing somebody for modern lawful life increasingly means preparing him to participate safely and independently in Digital India.

From Digital Prison Administration to Digital Correction

India already has important pieces of the technological foundation. The next stage should be to ask how deeply that technology can penetrate everyday prison life without compromising security. Can transferable paper value be replaced with a secure digital wallet? Can every authorised rupee become traceable? Can communication and Mulakat be digitally organised? Can grievances leave reliable trails? Can routine records become more auditable? Can prisoners themselves receive meaningful digital education?

That is the distinction between digital prison administration and digital correction. Digitising records is useful, installing CCTV is useful, computerising administrative systems is useful, and biometric identification can be useful. But the larger opportunity is to use technology to improve transparency, accountability, communication, education and preparation for release.

None of this requires turning a prison into an unrestricted digital environment. Security and technological modernisation are not opposites. A well-designed correctional technology system can remain closed, controlled and monitored while still being modern, transparent and educational.

When Does Digital India Cross the Prison Gate?

India has already demonstrated that technology can travel almost anywhere. It has moved from metropolitan banks to roadside tea stalls, from government offices to smartphones, and from cash transactions to QR codes. The prison gate should not become the point where that journey stops.

Digital India will truly cross the prison gate when technology moves beyond administrative offices and reaches everyday institutional life—when authorised money is transparently accounted for, when spent value cannot continue circulating anonymously, when legitimate communication and Mulakat are efficiently managed, when grievances leave reliable trails, when routine processes become auditable, and when prisoners themselves are educated for the technological society to which many of them will eventually return.

Technology should never replace humanity, discretion or responsible prison officers. Nor should digitisation merely become a more sophisticated way of watching prisoners. Its purpose can be much more constructive: use technology not only to administer the prisoner, but also to protect the transaction, strengthen transparency and educate the person.

We take pride in a country where a ₹20 cup of tea can be paid for digitally on a roadside within seconds. India already possesses extraordinary technological capability. The unfinished question is whether that transformation can travel through one more difficult door—from the government server to the prison office, from the prison office to the barrack floor, and from the barrack floor, eventually, back into Digital India.

That, to me, would be a meaningful technological journey from Kara Gruh to Sudhara Gruh—from confinement to correction.

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About the Author

Saurabh Thakore is an author and independent writer exploring life, society, human behaviour, choices, consequences, systems and change. His writing combines lived experience with observation and questions about realities that often remain unnoticed beneath everyday life.

The author of ‘The Other Prison’ and ‘Prison Break Without Escape’

I observe. I question. I write.