A Recent survey, conducted on 4,000 substance addicts lodged in Tihar Jail in the last year, has been found that 90 per cent of addicts lodged in the jail belong to financially underprivileged backgrounds with meagre or no known source of income.

While around 43 per cent of addicts earned between Rs 2,000 to Rs 5,000 per month, a high percentage of addicts spent Rs 200 to Rs 500 on drugs every day. The survey also revealed that 55 per cent of addicts are illiterate.

A report of the survey, conducted by the NGO Aasra with the help of the jail authorities, was handed over to the Director General (Prisons) B K Gupta last month, which was accessed by Newsline. The survey was conducted by the NGO volunteers who interviewed the 4,000 inmates on their drug habits, age group, working conditions, educational and family background.

“The findings are very interesting. We have found out important information regarding their behaviour before and after they started using drugs, the kind of drugs they consumed and the reasons,” a jail official said.

The most surprising find of the survey is that most drug addicts, unlike popular perception, are not from the privileged sections of society. While merely 9.5 percent of them belong to the business class or come from a financially secure background, 90.5 per cent of those interviewed are rickshaw pullers (10 per cent), fruit sellers (3), agricultural labourers (3), vegetable sellers (8), unemployed youth (10.5), drivers (9), labourers (23.5), transport workers (4) or similarly employed (10).

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