Alipore Jail
The Alipore Jail or Alipore Central Jail, also known as Presidency Correctional Home, is a prison in Alipore, Kolkata, where political prisoners were kept under British rule, among them Subhas Chandra Bose. It also housed the Alipore Jail Press. It is no longer in operation as a jail, having been shut down on 20 February 2019.[2] The jail site is being developed as an Independence museum in the name of the martyrs who were imprisoned and executed there.[3] It is also sometimes used for film shoots.
| Location | Alipore, Kolkata |
|---|---|
| Status | Open |
| Security class | Maximum |
| Capacity | 2000 |
| Opened | 1864[1] |
| Former name | Old Alipore Jail |
Notable inmates
- Sri Aurobindo (May 1908 – May 1909), imprisoned after the Alipore bomb case. During his stay he wrote a series of articles in Bengali in the journal Suprabhat, later published as Tales of Prison life. He later said, "I have spoken of a year's imprisonment. It would have been more appropriate to speak of a year's living in an ashram or a hermitage. The only result of the wrath of the British Government was that I found God."[4]
- Dudu Miyan (1857–61)
- Subhas Chandra Bose
- K. Kamaraj (1930)
- Ramakrishna Biswas
- Bidhan Chandra Roy (1930)
- Parul Mukherjee (1930s)
- Charu Mazumdar
- Pramod Ranjan Choudhury (1926)
- Dr. Jack Preger, MBE (1981)
- P. Kakkan
- Charu Chandra Bose
Alipore Jail Museum
Having been shut down from 20 February 2019, Alipore Jail is no longer in operation as a jail, and later turned into a museum (predominantly developed as an independence museum).[5][6] It is being maintained by the West Bengal Housing Infrastructure Development Corporation (WBHIDCO).[7]
References
- "Presidency Correctional Home". Archived from the original on 24 April 2023. Retrieved 4 May 2023.
- "End of an era as Alipore Central jail closes down". Business Standard. India. Archived from the original on 9 November 2021. Retrieved 4 December 2010.
- "Alipore jail to house museum on Independence movement". The Times of India. Archived from the original on 9 October 2021. Retrieved 9 October 2021.
- "The Prison-Cell of Alipore". Sri Aurobindo Society. Archived from the original on 30 November 2010. Retrieved 4 December 2010.
- "Alipore Jail Museum – History and Information". independencemuseum.in. Archived from the original on 18 March 2023. Retrieved 4 May 2023.
- Roy, Suryagni (22 September 2022). "Kolkata's 116-year-old Alipore jail turns into museum, open for public – Details here". India Today. Kolkata. Archived from the original on 3 October 2022. Retrieved 4 May 2023.
- Banerjee, Debanjana (26 November 2022). "Alipore Jail Museum: Where history is kept in a freeze frame". The Statesman. Kolkata. Archived from the original on 25 November 2022. Retrieved 4 May 2023.