We have all seen many movies that show jails and what happens inside them. And if Bollywood is anything to be believed, the food served to the inmates isn’t really good. But what’s actually the case? Let us find out.
Here we look at Quora answers from people who have been to jails in India. This is the food they were served behind bars.
1. A jail in Andhra Pradesh.
Breakfast – Pulihora / Tamarind Rice, every day, served at around 6:30 AM.
Lunch – Rice, Watery Sambar with no vegetables in it. A different type of curry every day. Served at around 11:30 AM.
Dinner – Freshly cooked rice with rasam. Leftover sambar from lunch. One egg for long-timers. Served at around 5:00 PM.
On Sunday – 200 gm of mutton (goat) or chicken curry. Very very well made. The curry is weighed so that everyone gets a fair and equal amount and no fights breakout. The curry is so good that the policemen would dine with us. The vegetarians would get a special curry on Sunday.
Answer courtesy: Quora/Anonymous
2. Taloja Central Jail
First, we have tea with milk and then breakfast like poha (flattened rice) or sheera (sajjige) is served.
In the afternoon, we eat rice with dal, roti, and vegetables with no spices. Again in the evening, tea is served and for dinner, we are given daal, roti, rice, and vegetables, in good quantity. I don’t think any other central jail gives such good treatment to its prisoners. But this jail isn’t very old and has very few prisoners, compared to others.
Answer courtesy: Quora/Ashish Tiwari
3. Central Jail, Amritsar
Breakfast : You will be serving tea at the time of barrack opening in the morning.
Lunch : In morning around 7.30 only you will be provide with 5 rotis and a bowl of daal which you can eat for morning else you eat for lunch. There is no seperate breakfast and lunch.
Around 3 PM, 1 glass of salty and watery tea is served again.
Dinner : Evening around 5 PM you will be provided again with 5 rotis and bowl of another daal will be provided for night.
Note: No non-veg served in this jail.
Answer courtesy: Quora/Anonymous
4. Tihar Jail
Breakfast: at 7:00 AM, tea and poha/kulche chole.
Lunch: at 12:30 PM, 4 roti, seasonal subzi, rice, and dal.
Evening tea: Biscuit. Dinner: Same as the lunch with different vegetables.
Sunday is funday with paneer dishes/cudhi/rajma, sweet and curd. The Tihar shop sells delicious bakery items, better than the market.
Answer courtesy: Quora/Akshay Prabhash Sharma
5. Ghaghidih Central Jail, Jamshedpur
Day in jail starts around 6 in the morning when tea is served to all prisoners after that distribution of lunch starts around 9 and continues till 11 AM.
For lunch, prisoners were served with rice, dal, and vegetables which were generally grown inside the premises. Tea was distributed again around 3 PM, followed by dinner around 5 which consisted of 5 chapatis and vegetables (same as lunch).
Non-veg item like chicken was distributed once in fortnight on Fridays. Quantity was restricted to two pieces per person. Food was pathetic and we used to jokingly refer it as cattle feed. We relied upon ‘jugad food’ which used to cost us few bucks.
Answer courtesy: Quora/Ayush Vedant
6. Bhondsi Jail, Gurgaon
You get 4 slices of bread and half a liter of milk pouch between two inmates.Lunch is 4 horrible rotis with veg curry or dal which is 90% water. The rotis are always burnt and break as you try to bend them to make a bite. The vegetables are either ghiya (bottle gourd) or petha (pumpkin).On Sundays, you get potatoes in the same inedible curry. The dinner menu is no different. The worst part is the container in which it is brought to your barracks. It resembles a wrought-iron dust-bin and you are not provided with any plates or bowls.Prisoners (under trials or convicted) usually survive on canteen food which is available for all for purchase.
Answer courtesy: Quora/Ishwar Jha
7. Juvenile Jail in Dongri, Mumbai
For breakfast, we would get Poha with tea. Or daal with roti and tea.
For lunch, it would be roti, sabji, chaawal and daal. The daal was more water and the rice would be filled with stones. 4 rotis and no extras roti.
The same would be for dinner. But if the lunch food wouldn’t be finished, the same would be served for dinner. No non-vegetarian food would be served at all.Only on Fridays, we would get 2 hard-boiled eggs for dinner which we would have to trade for a lost carrom game we had lost with some other inmate.
Answer courtesy: Quora/Anonymous
8. Chanchalguda Prison, Hyderabad
Breakfast : You get breakfast at around 7:00 AM and it can be chapati, upma etc. which is served in a very limited quantity. You will definitely wish to have more but you can’t. You also get tea.
Lunch: Around 12:30 PM. You get an abundance of rice and curry, but you may not always like them.
The best idea would be to buy some pickles from the prison canteen and have some snacks with lunch to have a stomach full of rice. Supper: Around 5:30 PM. You again get an abundance of rice with curry. And it is better to have a pickle and some snacks from the canteen.You are locked up after 6:00 PM.
Answer courtesy: Quora/Anonymous
The more you learn.
Note: All the answers belong to the Quora users credited in the article and we couldn’t verify the information independently.