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Mahuya Bandyopadhya discusses the culture of incarceration or ‘carceral culture’ in modern India by drawing on ideas of the prison/street interface.

Image courtesy of interviewee. April 15, 2024

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This video video is a transcript of a discussion led by an academic focusing on their research related to contemporary Indian culture, specifically regarding the experiences of prisoners and marginalized communities. The speaker reflects on their doctoral fieldwork conducted in a West Bengal prison. They observed a phenomenon of "narrative inversion" among young male prisoners, who perceived incarceration as a space of possibility in contrast to their constrained neighborhoods. The speaker elaborates on the concept of "castral culture," highlighting how environments outside prison, such as neighborhoods and streets, can exhibit similar dynamics of control and marginalization. They discuss the methodological challenges of studying criminal lives and assert that the phenomena of hyper-incarceration, hyper-surveillance, and the presence of carceral conditions extend beyond prison walls into the lives of those categorized as disposable by the state. The speaker emphasizes the importance of using ethnographic methods to uncover underrepresented voices and critique the tendency to generalize findings from individual narratives. They specifically highlight the experiences of women prisoners and local "goons," showing how their stories reveal societal vulnerabilities and tensions. Additionally, the speaker critiques the processes that define and maintain disposability within communities, linking it to broader societal structures and state actions that aim to isolate and control certain populations. They call for a recognition of the complexity of these issues and suggest a need for a decolonial perspective in academic research, arguing that a comprehensive understanding of prison and societal structures must consider a range of intersecting influences, including patriarchal family dynamics and socio-political factors.

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Thank you, Sam.

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Uh, it's a pleasure to do this

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and talk about my work with you.

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Yeah. So I think, the idea for, writing on culture,

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castral cultures in contemporary India actually comes from

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my doctoral, field work, which was in,

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in a prison in, west Ngal in, India.

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And, in that, I found

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that many young male prisoners were actually doing

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this narrative inversion.

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And by narrative inversion, I really mean that they were,

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inverting the way they saw the prison

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and the para or the neighborhood.

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Uh, and what they would do is that,

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they would think of the neighborhood as a space

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of these insurmountable constraints.

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And in contrast, the prison would appear as a space that,

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actually offered space to, to take decisions, to do

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what they wanted to, to explore and so on.

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So I think that, the prison became a space

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of possibility, became a space with, of possibility

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with the potential for, agency, resistance

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and freedom, and that that's not

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how one thinks of the prison.

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Right. And of course,

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this narrative inversion is narrative.

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So it is looking at the neighborhood from the context

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of the, from the vantage point of the prison.

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Uh, but it is this that I wanted

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to actually explore further.

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And that was the beginning of some of the, sort

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of thinking around, caer reality

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and what I would call the casal mesh.

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Uh, because, and then, you know, in order to do this,

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what I did next was to try

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and find people, in, an underprivileged neighborhood

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who would fit this, you know, understanding

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who would be able to give an understanding

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and people who actually traverse both the

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prison and the neighborhood.

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Uh, now this was difficult to do,

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and, the paper that we are talking about today,

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you know, has just one narrative of,

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of such a person.

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But what I'm trying to do is to indicate

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that actually if you one looks at criminal careers,

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and especially in, if I think of it in, in the context

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of Bengal and in the context of the kind of context,

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politics and violence, you know, that politics involves,

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I think one can, you know,

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one can make this argument

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of the Castel mesh in certain kinds of lives,

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and that is what, the paper was actually trying to do.

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But tied to that is also a methodological question of then

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where does one study the prison?

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And where does one study, criminal lives?

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And it's not just the prison, you know, you could study,

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prison and prison-like circumstances

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and environments outside

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of these criminal justice institutions

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or outside of these sites of confinement.

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So, you know, all these, there's a sim, there's a similarity

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and an overlap of understanding in these three terms,

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whether you one talks of ca castral turn, castral condition,

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castral mesh, or Castral age,

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They're signifying two or three things.

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First is, the idea of hyper incarceration.

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And, you know, there's a lot

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of literature which addresses this mass imprisonment.

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The, the, basically the rise of incarceration of,

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and here the rise is of certain groups of population, right?

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Uh, certain kinds of population.

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So we know it's, you know, if one,

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if one thinks of it in the Indian context, we, we know

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that there are caste, tribe

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and other marginal identities, which tend

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to be overrepresented in the prison population.

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So, so the rise of incarceration of certain groups

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of population in most countries across the world,

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so incarceration then becomes to be, comes to be seen as,

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the kind of the valid response o of the state in order

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to isolate the dis disposable p population in order

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to segregate them from the rest of the population.

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The second is this presence of ality,

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or carceral conditions beyond the typical

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and obvious carceral institution.

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So one does not need to look at sites of confinement.

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So if I think of, you know, a, a a site of protest

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and how that is, sought to be controlled

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or how protests, you know, so then you have, you know,

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for instance, in India currently with regard

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to the farmers pro protest, the state has been putting up,

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you know, dividers has been putting up barricades in

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order to not allow people to enter certain spaces.

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So there is a kind of blocking off

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or a kind of isolation that happens similar to what,

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what would happen in, in a prison.

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So the presence of ality,

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in spaces which are not carceral.

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And I think third, with, with, along

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with this hyper incarceration, you have hyper surveillance

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and, you know, so you have hyper surveillance

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and the use of new technologies to actually monitor,

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control, discipline, your population,

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and also identify that dissenting voice, which needs

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to then be marked as disposable.

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And,

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and isolated from the, so this is, I think this is what we,

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what I understand by, the increase in ality

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or the castral term in Castral age.

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I think, you know, in all my work, I've,

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I've, I'm now I've now been trying to look at how one can,

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use ethnography

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or the qualitative data, narratives in order

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to make some of these, connections between,

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sort of institutional spaces of confinement

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and, the free streets

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or, you know, the neighborhood.

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And, there is, I mean, I, I see that, you know,

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there is a, there is a critique to this kind of work

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as well, because, you know, it, it, there is this thing

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Of how do you generalize, right?

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Can you say something general about the castral culture

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of India based on this one or two narratives?

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And I think that sometimes not wanting to generalize,

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and here one is really trying to sort of express

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and present a context of castral, of caster reality.

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Uh, so not, I would see this as a sign of not wanting

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to generalize and not wanting to generalize as a sign

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of methodological humility.

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There is this much that your narrative can, do.

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Um, it's also about, you know,

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interpreting contextual data.

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And so I, you know, I urge that some of these narratives

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and ethnographic venet be seen in that kind of light

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and uncovering the voices

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that are generally not going to be heard.

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So when we think of the prison, you know, you would,

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this is not something, these are voices

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that you may not necessarily, want to, hear.

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Um, and the third is that, you know, I find

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that sometimes generalizability is also kind

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of an overrated, criteria, for, for,

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understanding and evaluating research.

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So given that background, what I'm trying to do,

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if I look at, you know, that particular essay

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that we are talking about of Castran

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and tap entrapment, a later book, which is edited,

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which is co-edited actually with a colleague Rimple,

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who also works on prison.

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Um, in, in both these, I think what we are trying

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to do is trying to look at narratives and,

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and see, you know, if I think

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of criminal careers in the case of this narrative

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of the local, goon in a neighborhood in West Bengal,

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or if I look at narratives of, women prisoners,

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you know, both of these are actually, you know,

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provide a sort of fertile ground for, analysis

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of these continuities between, institutional spaces

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of confinement and, the prisons.

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And let me just give an example of how,

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so if I look at women prisoners lives,

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and, the particular essay that I wrote in,

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in this edited book on women, prisoners,

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it's called Women Incarcerated Narratives from India,

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which is actually a translated essay on a drawing from

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a book, which was written by a political prisoner.

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So there is this political prisoner from the seventies,

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who, is imprisoned in the context

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of her role in the nite movement in Bengal.

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And she writes about the ordinary prisoners.

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So I had actually translated one,

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and analyzed one such narrative of an ordinary prisoner,

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a young woman who, who came from Bangladesh,

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to visit her aunt and ended up in a broth head.

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And her narrative is fascinating

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because it shows for her discontinuity between the border,

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the brothel, the hospital, the prison as all sort of,

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you know, her experiences are very similar experiences of

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Violence, of the lack of agency

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and of the struggle to actually come to come, come,

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you know, take her own decisions.

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Those, those experiences are similar

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across these different sites.

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So I think women's narratives,

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are very powerful in showing the working of,

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patriarchal domination of caste linkages

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and patriarchal domination in state run institutions

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of confinement as well as in others.

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So there is a kind of continuity between the family

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and the prison, which women, prisoners narratives,

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who actually end up in prison, you know, they're able to,

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offer or they're able to show us these,

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continuities.

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So, so I think if one looks at these, I mean, you know,

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the narratives of, let's say career criminals,

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so the study of criminal, criminal careers,

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which will show these connections between, life

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inside prisons and outside, which is what,

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this narrative of the local, goon does.

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But what is interesting is that it's, you know,

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the narrative is, it, it's not simply the narrative

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of a strong man, because you,

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what it reveals is also the vulnerabilities

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of this person who's otherwise a strong man,

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and, you know, has some kind

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of power in the neighborhood.

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But, it, it, it reveals this kind of fragility of the,

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per of this powerful person.

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So if one, one, if one looks at that narrative,

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you know, this guy, he, this man, he surrenders

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to the police at one point

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because he sees surrendering to the police as a way

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of protecting one's life.

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Um, and, and then finally, if one looks at his death,

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his death is actually, caused, in a sense.

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And this is only what is reported in a sense by those,

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the people who are closest to him.

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So again, you know, it's this kind of tension,

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that is revealed, through this narrative.

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And that's the kind of tension that I was trying to,

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trying to, bring out.

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I think there isn't, I mean, there is,

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some literature which looks at the idea of,

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disposability.

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But when I look at it, in the context

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of my own work in the prison,

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and trying to understand, well, who then is the disposable?

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Um, and I say that there are multiple meanings,

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but there are multiple meanings

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because I think there isn't a kind of,

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it's not fixed.

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It's not a stable fixed category.

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So the techniques for classifying, identifying

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and categorizing who the disposable citizen is, and,

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and what the criteria should be, are neither stable,

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nor are they very organized.

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And this suits the state, to do so

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because, you know, the state can then,

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at different points come up with different explanations and,

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and identifications for who is disposable.

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Um, so it, so it, it is, it is fluid,

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it is susceptible to interpretation

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and, subject to, change.

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So if one looks at the, current

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Citizenship act in India, I think some of the discussions

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around that, shows this kind of,

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what should I call it, this kind of, instability in,

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and, and, you know, the second thing, I think that,

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that in order to understand disposability,

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I think it's important to, think about what is trying,

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what is it that is being erased.

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So I think the concept of disposability

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and erasure are, are linked.

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Uh, and you'll see that in the prison that what you,

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what is happening is, you know,

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through the prison erasure is a certain kind

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of erasure is being accomplished through confinement,

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through the imposition of barriers, to the per

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through the performance of ordinary lives.

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So that's what happens when you are confined.

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You can't perform your ordinary life.

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Um, but it's also accomplished through certain kinds

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of dehumanizing behaviors.

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Now, when you look at those dehumanizing behaviors, they're,

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again, not just confined to the prison.

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I mean, if one looks at police violence on the streets,

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that is equally dehumanizing as

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what happens, in the prison.

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So there is a kind of, marking out of,

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the disposable life through these processes.

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You know, one part of it happens within the prison,

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and there is a large part that also happens, outside.

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Um, so the disposability then could, if I link it

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to this idea of raise, then I know that it could mean,

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this state of, a condition of abandonment,

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by state and society, right?

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So it could, it could also refer to exploitation

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of certain kinds of bodies, you know, of if,

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if one looks at labor

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and conditions of labor currently in many, like,

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if you talk about sweatshops, I mean,

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and you don't have to go that far to talk abouts sweatshops.

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If one just looks at, you know,

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for instance the delivery workers and the kind of hours

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and context of work,

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I think one can, one can see that.

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So the use of bodies to only serve the interests of profit

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and monetary gain until the body is no longer able

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to serve, right?

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And, so

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after which it is then again, subject to this kind of era,

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it is left abandoned to wither away.

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It also means that, there is a kind of, I mean, in,

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I think in neoliberal governance,

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I think the state is also heavily invested in identifying

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who the weak, errant, marginal citizen is,

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and bringing them in within the folds of governance.

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And often this is done through making them as beneficiaries

14:31.685 --> 14:34.065
of certain schemes, and so on.

14:34.485 --> 14:38.665
And, so, so what, what, what does, what does this do?

14:38.665 --> 14:40.785
It brings them within the fold of governance.

14:41.325 --> 14:44.825
It, you know, the state, attempts to help them,

14:44.885 --> 14:48.025
but at the same time, they're always on the brink of Raisa.

14:48.245 --> 14:51.205
So it's actually not, you know, a not a,

14:51.545 --> 14:55.045
not a real assistance in that, in that, sense.

14:55.545 --> 15:00.325
So, yeah, so I think that, now in addition

15:00.345 --> 15:04.285
to this, I think there are, what we call the vigilantes

15:04.905 --> 15:07.485
who also perform the work of, again,

15:08.205 --> 15:11.645
identifying the disposable, disposable of, you know,

15:11.965 --> 15:15.605
ensuring this kind of surveillance when the state agencies

15:15.625 --> 15:18.365
are not actually, doing this kind of surveillance.

15:18.705 --> 15:20.845
So this is what I mean by, you know,

15:20.845 --> 15:22.725
the multiple meanings of disposability.

15:23.145 --> 15:25.365
But at the same time, when you think

15:25.705 --> 15:28.765
of disposable populations, I mean, if I'm think of the us,

15:29.265 --> 15:32.405
when one thinks of, you know, India, I think,

15:32.585 --> 15:36.405
we know in a sense what those disposable, contexts

15:36.405 --> 15:38.685
and populations are.

15:39.185 --> 15:43.605
So, so, again, I don't think that they're necessarily,

15:44.025 --> 15:48.125
they, they're necessarily planned

15:48.345 --> 15:51.525
or they're necessarily organized as vigilantes.

15:51.985 --> 15:54.965
Uh, and there is, I mean, there is, I I would say that,

15:55.025 --> 15:59.685
you know, there can be some discussion on this as

15:59.685 --> 16:02.925
to whether, you know, there exists a sort of band

16:02.925 --> 16:04.245
of vigilantes, you know,

16:04.245 --> 16:06.085
whether there necessarily like hired

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goons, and I don't think they are.

16:08.105 --> 16:12.565
Um, I think that, there are ordinary people like you

16:12.565 --> 16:16.685
and me who then choose to highlight, certain kinds

16:16.685 --> 16:18.525
of norms which become very important,

16:19.105 --> 16:22.765
and, which are then sort of, played out,

16:22.905 --> 16:25.485
on the street often through, violence.

16:25.625 --> 16:28.365
You know, I remember several years ago, you know,

16:28.365 --> 16:31.045
when I was doing field work in this urban neighborhood, one

16:31.045 --> 16:33.405
of my young women in interlocutors,

16:33.405 --> 16:36.245
and this was, you know, the field work was in,

16:36.305 --> 16:38.495
in two thousands.

16:38.495 --> 16:40.775
And she was talking about her time as a student,

16:41.395 --> 16:42.615
and so it was, you know,

16:42.615 --> 16:45.375
maybe late nineties or mid nineties.

16:45.595 --> 16:47.735
And she said that, you know, in this,

16:47.735 --> 16:50.975
Muslim working class neighborhood, when she went

16:51.115 --> 16:55.335
to school and she had worn her the pata in a particular way,

16:55.755 --> 17:00.135
she was actually beaten on the street by one of the,

17:00.195 --> 17:01.775
men from her neighborhood.

17:02.395 --> 17:05.335
And, so, so this is, you know, again, what, what

17:05.485 --> 17:08.215
what you're trying to do here is that you're trying to

17:08.845 --> 17:13.175
instate a certain kind of, a certain kind of sociality,

17:13.415 --> 17:14.495
a certain kind of behavior

17:14.995 --> 17:17.055
and failing, which there will be violence.

17:17.195 --> 17:19.255
And I think that, again,

17:19.255 --> 17:22.295
and I think that is connected to how one sees the castral,

17:22.555 --> 17:25.255
because here again, you don't need the prison to,

17:25.395 --> 17:27.295
to control, to dehumanize,

17:27.395 --> 17:31.975
and it can be done, very well on the street,

17:32.235 --> 17:36.175
by just, maybe somebody, you know, as a neighbor,

17:36.175 --> 17:37.175
and so on and so forth.

17:37.315 --> 17:40.535
So, I think, I mean, theoretically, I would say yes,

17:40.555 --> 17:44.655
it is possible, but if one looks at, current conditions,

17:45.235 --> 17:46.375
both in,

17:46.435 --> 17:50.805
and I'm saying this in terms of, you know, both in terms

17:50.805 --> 17:52.725
of research and activism,

17:52.745 --> 17:54.765
if one looks at current conditions,

17:54.965 --> 17:58.365
I don't think they are suitable to develop,

17:58.465 --> 18:00.765
to think about a decolonial perspectives.

18:01.225 --> 18:02.965
Um, so especially with regards,

18:02.965 --> 18:04.365
and I'm talking really in, in terms

18:04.365 --> 18:07.325
of criminal justice institutions, the prison,

18:07.445 --> 18:10.685
criminology as a discipline, you know, you know

18:10.685 --> 18:12.445
that there's, there's very little support

18:12.585 --> 18:14.925
for research in these state controlled institutions.

18:15.505 --> 18:19.845
Um, a huge sum of money has to be paid as security in order

18:19.845 --> 18:22.525
to get access to the prison, which very, you know, which,

18:22.705 --> 18:25.165
and I mean, not that that guarantees access.

18:26.065 --> 18:28.885
Um, so there, there, you know, these sites

18:28.885 --> 18:31.245
of confinement are inaccessible.

18:31.705 --> 18:34.485
We know very little of what goes on inside these sites.

18:35.065 --> 18:38.565
Um, there's not enough funding for research in these areas.

18:39.225 --> 18:42.645
Um, you know, much of the funding is dev is, driven

18:42.745 --> 18:46.005
by science, by the natural, you know,

18:46.285 --> 18:50.525
questions in the natural sciences, critiques

18:50.525 --> 18:52.965
and activist orientations in with regard

18:52.965 --> 18:57.045
to these issues are often perceived as dissenting views.

18:57.705 --> 19:00.565
And these dissenting views are quickly criminalized.

19:00.745 --> 19:05.405
So there is always that fear of, you know, being labeled

19:05.625 --> 19:06.645
as a dissenter.

19:07.225 --> 19:08.725
Um, and finally,

19:08.965 --> 19:11.285
I think the academic space in the global south,

19:12.145 --> 19:13.545
I don't think has come onto its own.

19:13.685 --> 19:15.465
It is still, it continues

19:15.465 --> 19:17.625
to follow the evaluative standards of the West.

19:18.205 --> 19:19.945
And, you know, we write

19:20.045 --> 19:21.905
and speak in the languages of the west,

19:22.125 --> 19:23.265
so that is also a problem.

19:23.845 --> 19:26.145
So, and in addition, the model

19:26.145 --> 19:28.105
of the natural sciences continue to define

19:28.125 --> 19:30.065
how research is done in,

19:30.065 --> 19:31.745
the social sciences and humanities.

19:32.085 --> 19:35.705
So I think in the Indian context, I think, you know,

19:35.765 --> 19:38.065
as far as, looking at prisons

19:38.125 --> 19:39.945
and understanding criminal justice systems

19:40.205 --> 19:41.785
and criminology,

19:42.045 --> 19:45.025
and the other disciplines, which sort of like anthropology,

19:45.175 --> 19:48.185
sociology, which, which look at these issues,

19:48.345 --> 19:49.705
I think we are very, very far away

19:49.705 --> 19:50.905
from a decolonial perspective.

19:51.125 --> 19:55.065
But if it does have to emerge, I think that it'll have

19:55.065 --> 19:57.505
to recognize this kind of continuity.

19:57.925 --> 20:00.865
And so we cannot talk of the Bri prison without talking

20:00.865 --> 20:03.145
of the border, you know, so, you know,

20:03.245 --> 20:04.985
and so if one, if one,

20:05.005 --> 20:06.945
or we cannot talk of the prison without talking

20:06.945 --> 20:08.145
about the patriarchal family.

20:08.765 --> 20:11.665
So there is a need to then think about all

20:11.665 --> 20:13.465
of these institutional spaces together.

20:14.065 --> 20:14.185
I.

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