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| Sunday, 17 August 2003 |
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'A tranquil mind is void of crime' : Florine Marzook brings a ray of hope to women prisoners by LAKMAL WELABADA If I call her the Godmother of the prisoners no one would disagree.
Like Mother Teresa she shares a kind word with the female prisoners who flock around her as soon as she steps into the female ward. The little children who hang on to their poisoned mothers' robes stare at her with hopes as if she is the only saviour in their lives. 'Prison is a University of Life,' says Florine Marzook the social worker whose heart breaks for the wretched lives of the female prisoners. She is the wife of the Commissioner General of Prisons of Sri Lanka Rumy Marzook with whom she engages in many projects for the welfare of prisoners. Florine's wish is to create public awareness of the impoverished woeful lives of prisoners who need the merciful, kind and caring word from the world. "From the cases I have dealt with so far I learnt that most of the women in prisons have got involved in crimes due to poverty and unawareness of laws. They had no idea of the repercussions of what they were doing. Drug trafficking is one such thing," says Florine who invites the media and NGOs to be more involved in educating the general public on the laws of the land. "Working for the community has come my way after I got married. For about two years I worked for the Sri Lanka Muslim Women's Congress, an NGO where I was influenced and inspired by Jezima Ismail immensely. And I still run to her whenever I need advice," she said. The female prisoners treat her as a friend, whom they never expected, being the Commissioner General's wife, to be so close to them; and listen to their pathetic stories, especially about their children whose lives have deteriorated in their absence. "Some of them are imprisoned for not being able to pay the fine. Thousands of rupees are not within their reach," said Florine.She has helped many such women to pay their fines out of her own resources. "People tend to free animals for their birthdays and to reduce misfortune during the inauspicious time. So why not free 'people'?" Florine asks. "One would argue that the criminals should be punished. That's true. But actually when you look at them from a humanitarian angle, they are the real victims. The victims of a villainous society. Most of them she helped to get released were mothers who got caught for minor offences. Their absence has caused a lot of problems for their children who are apparently on the street without food, clothing, shelter or a guardian. The story of twenty five-year-old S.T. Anoma Nishanthi is heartbreaking. At present Anoma is in the Welikada remand. She is suspected of killing her husband. But she swears upon her children saying that she has never even thought of doing such a thing. Her two daughters of seven and five years are with their grandmother (Anoma's mother) at Rajanganaya. They were at Kelaniya before Anoma was remanded. The two children were studying well in Colombo. Anoma had studied upto O/Level, and was a vendor at the Sunday fair at Kelaniya. Today there's no one to feed her children. The sick grandmother brings the children to the Welikada remand to see their mother. Once they come to Colombo they don't have money to return to Rajanganaya. The female jailers collect the bus fare for them each time they visit. Anoma is getting legal assistance from a human rights group, says Florine. Florine suggests that the public can help with a foster parents scheme for the children who become destitute in the absence of their mothers serving jail terms. The very small children who are allowed to stay with their imprisoned mothers are given over to orphanages when they are five years old, and may not be able to be with the mother if she is sent to jail for life, or if not in a position to look after them even when she comes out. "'Caring' is the best medicine for the wounds of these people's hearts," she believes. "Once they get remanded or imprisoned they develop an inferiority complex of being rejected by society. Without looking down on them we should help them to rebuild their ruined lives," she said. A female prisoner whom Florine helped to free got a job in a garment factory soon after the release. Today she draws about Rs. 9000. She was an educated girl, but did not have a steady income. She was remanded when the police found some heroin at her place which she said belonged to her husband who was missing at that time. Ultimately she was fined and sent to jail. Her four year old child was left with the grandmother. "I was so happy when I heard she got a job as soon as she was released. When you do good things, there are others who are willing to continue the rest," she said. The Prisons Department conducts many projects to develop the skills of the prisoners and help them stand on their own feet once they go out into society. A new programme to be launched very shortly is meditation. "We have asked Sarvodaya to conduct meditation programmes. Both the prisoners and prison officers will reap great benefits out of that. A tranquil mind is void of crime," explained Florine. The Sri Lankan prisons are filled with convicts and repeat remand offenders. At present the Welikada Prison alone has about 4379 male prisoners and 394 females. "While putting up buildings for their accommodation, we thought of building meditation centres as well at each prison since more than 'punishing', we believe in 'healing'," she said. Florine says that lack of a psychiatrist is one of the problems the Prisons Department faces in planning future counselling projects. Florine thinks that wellwishers would get the humane message of helping to bail out convicted women who do not have the means to pay fines imposed on them and consequently serve jail terms. She also appeals to citizens to provide some sort of employment for these unfortunate women when they are released from prison. The rationale behind it being that following the release these women would not be forced to break the law to provide their families with a meal. |
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