MENTAL HEALTH

“Long sentences will make your mind crack…”

A finger is pointed towards the two women quickly approaching, grins ear-to-ear pasted across their faces. It’s our first visit to Central Jail, and we’re getting a tour of the grounds. Looking to our left and right trying to absorb as much as possible from this new place, we hear our guide rattling off information about the women who live here and their facilities. She barely pauses as she points and says “they’re mentally ill,” before moving on to tell us about something else. We look to one another and wonder if we had misheard something. [1] After 30 years working in prisons, the atrocity of imprisoning someone for something so clearly beyond their control seems to have become a matter-of-fact.

We admittedly don’t know much about these women. All we really know is hey hugged and kissed the woman who brought us here.

One of them hugs, and gives a kiss on the cheek of the NGO founder who had brought us here. We weren’t told more specifically what they were diagnosed with, or maybe there was no diagnose. As one can imagine, imprisonment aggravates existing mental health problems which spotlights the urgency to transfer mentally disabled detainees to appropriate facilities. [2]

OHCHR notes that, “Despite the Supreme Court mandamus order to Government authorities on 16 October 2008 to hospitalise mentally disabled detainees and ensure they receive proper treatment, no corrective action was taken as of 26 November 2008.” [3] From our interviews and observations, we can add that as of May 2019, no corrective action is still not taken. [4] This problem roots from the lack of mental health policy framework, infrastructure, mental health services. [5] Closed institutions, like prisons, endanger mentally disabled people’s human rights as they are vulnerable to abuse, sexual assault and violence by other prisoners and guards. [6]

Some prisoners also develop mental health conditions while in prison, and those who have faced domestic and/or sexual violence prior to imprisonment are especially at high risk. In addition, women’s sudden change of status from career to “criminal” combined with isolation from their family and community is said to have an immense impact on their mental health. [7]

“Long sentences will make your mind crack… many people have lost their memory in here,”

whispers an older foreigner who has spent over nine years in prison. We could only imagine the sense of helplessness and frustration this woman must’ve felt when she learned she’d have to spend an additional four years here because of the fine associated with her sentence. [8] A fine she is fully capable of paying, but due to the regulations on transferring large sums of money across the border into Nepal, her money is stuck with her two sons back home.

Another foreigner, sentenced to four years due to her inability to pay the fine for overstaying her visa, tells us of the immense loneliness and isolation she feels. Not only is she unable to communicate with her fellow inmates, she also gets very few visitors. She tells us that due to an incident with a foreigner visitor a few years ago in the male ward of Central Jail, prison management made their policies much more strict to approve foreign visitation throughout Nepal. Now, her friends and family not only have to fly to Nepal, they also have to pay a large fine to her embassy for a visitation letter, attain a letter of approval from the Nepali Consulate, and the Department of Prison Management before visiting. [9]

It is clear to us that mental health is a health concern faced by many if not all prisoners in some form. Despite this, it unfortunately appears as though there are not sufficient resources to aid prisoners in managing such things, no matter the severity.

MENTAL HEALTH: Project

[1] Indira Ranamagar, April 21, 2019.
[2] UNOCD, p. 11.
“Sometimes persons with mental disabilities, who have committed no offence, are placed in prisons, due to the lack of suitable mental health institutions. In some jurisdictions persons acquitted of criminal offences on the basis of their mental disability at the time of the commission of such offences are still detained in prisons. Both of these practices contravene a number of fundamental human rights principles, as well as Article 82 of the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners which recommends specialized treatment rather than imprisonment in such cases.”
UNOCD, p. 9.
The term mental disability covers both psychiatric disabilities and intellectual disabilities. “Psychiatric disabilities may be major, e.g. schizophrenia and bipolar disorder; or more minor mental health problems, often referred to as psychosocial problems, e.g. mild anxiety disorders. Intellectual disabilities are defined as “a condition of arrested of incomplete development of the mind characterized by impairment of skills and overall intelligence in areas such as cognition, language, and motor or social abilities.”
[3] OHCHR-Nepal, p.14.
[4] Add how many mentally disabled detaineed we encountered/were pointed out to us
[5] Nagendra P. Luitel et al., "Mental Health Care in Nepal: Current Situation and Challenges for Development of a District Mental Health Care Plan," Conflict and Health 9, no. 1 (2015): , doi:10.1186/s13031-014-0030-5.
In 1997, Nepal developed its National Mental Health policy, however, significant challenges were faced in the implementation of the policy framework into practice. In addition, insufficient funds and lack of hospitals providing mental health services continue to repeat the cycle of untreated mental health issues.
[6] UNOCD, p. 15.
[7] United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). “Handbook on Women and Imprisonment,” United Nations (2014).
[8] Anonymous (foreigner inmate). April 21, 2019.
[9] Anonymous (foreigner inmate 2). April 21, 2019.

MENTAL HEALTH: Text