3-028-323 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Alipore Gaol, Calcutta, 1870. 'This institution...is the great industrial prison of Lower Bengal, [containing] 2300 inmates. In it convict labour is, and has been for the last fifteen years, thoroughly utilised in remunerative industry. The handicrafts followed in it are weaving, carpentry, smith's-work, printing, lithography, and stereotyping. The gaol is guarded by thirty armed men; its inner guarding is performed by convict warders, and the labour is chiefly supervised by convict work-masters. All labour is regulated by task-work, and the minimum task exacted is that performed by a free and skilled workman of the same class. The workmen and artisans trained in the prison find ready employment outside; and in an experience of some years no skilled workman has been known to relapse into crime or to return to the prison. The gaol has been self-supporting for some years, and now yields in addition a considerable revenue to the State. The cost of the prison, in 1868, was £11,670; its earnings - £38,790 - showing an excess over cost of £27,000. The Illustration shows the interior of the gaol on Sunday, when none but works of necessity are performed. The inmates being Hindoos and Mohammedans, there are no religious observances on that day'. From "Illustrated London News", 1870.