Editing Cellular Jail (section)

==History==
{{see also|Ross Island Penal Colony}}
Although the prison complex itself was constructed between 1896 and 1906, the British authorities in India had been using the Andaman Islands as a prison since the days in the immediate aftermath of the [[Indian Rebellion of 1857]].{{citation needed|date=June 2021}}

[[File:Port Blair 1872 Ross Island Penal HQ.jpg|thumb|left|200px|The [[Ross Island Penal Colony|Ross Island Prison Headquarters]], 1872]]

Shortly after the rebellion was suppressed, captured [[Prisoner|prisoners]] were put on trial, with many of them being executed. Others were exiled for life to the [[Andaman Sea|Andamans]] to prevent them from re-offending. Two hundred rebels were transported to the islands under the custody of the jailer David Barry and Major [[James Pattison Walker]], an [[Indian Medical Service]] (IMS) doctor who had been warden of the prison at [[Agra]]. Another 733 from [[Karachi]] arrived in April 1868.<ref>{{cite web | url = http://www.andamancellularjail.org/History.htm##Link1 | title = History of Andaman Cellular Jail | work = This is about Andaman Cellular Jail | url-status = usurped | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070118091924/http://www.andamancellularjail.org/History.htm%23 | archive-date=18 January 2007 }}</ref> In 1863, the Rev. Henry Fisher Corbyn, of the Bengal Ecclesiastical Establishment, was also sent out there and he set up the 'Andamanese Home' there, which was also a repressive institution albeit disguised as a charitable one.<ref>George Weber, ''Pioneer Biographies of the British Period to 1947'', np, nd, Appendix A</ref> Rev. Corbyn was posted in 1866 as [[Vicar]] to [[St. Luke's Church, Abbottabad]], and later died there and is buried at the [[Old Christian Cemetery, Abbottabad]].  More prisoners arrived from India and Burma as the settlement grew.<ref name="andamangovt">{{cite web | title=Hundred years of the Andamans Cellular Jail |publisher=Andaman and Nicobar Administration website | url = http://www.and.nic.in/cjail-hun.htm | access-date = 2 September 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070930023549/http://www.and.nic.in/cjail-hun.htm |archive-date=30 September 2007 }} Source: ''[[The Hindu]]'', 21 December 2005.</ref> Anyone who belonged to the Mughal royal family, or who had sent a petition to [[Bahadur Shah Zafar]] during the Rebellion was liable to be deported to the islands.{{Citation needed|date=May 2014}}

[[File:Viper New Jails Construction.JPG|thumb|250px|right|Port Blair - Viper New Jails under construction]]
The remote islands were considered to be a suitable place to punish the independence activists. Not only were they isolated from the mainland, the overseas journey (''[[Kala pani (taboo)|kala pani]]'') to the islands also threatened them with loss of caste, resulting in [[social exclusion]].<ref name="AlisonCarolyn2012">{{cite book | author1=Alison Bashford | author2=Carolyn Strange | title=Isolation: Places and Practices of Exclusion | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=z72MP1zc4KgC&pg=PA37 | access-date=2 February 2013 | date=12 November 2012 | publisher=Psychology Press | isbn=978-0-415-30980-6 | page=37 }}</ref> The convicts were also used in [[chain gang]]s to construct prisons, buildings, and [[harbour]] facilities.{{Citation needed|date=May 2014}}

By the late 19th century, the [[Indian independence movement|independence movement]] had picked up momentum. As a result, the number of prisoners being sent to the Andamans grew and the need for a high-security prison was felt.  From August 1889 [[Charles James Lyall]] served as home secretary in the Raj government, and was also tasked with an investigation of the penal settlement at [[Port Blair]].<ref name=ODNB>{{ODNBweb|id=34642|title=Lyall, Sir Charles James}}</ref><ref name=IndiaList1905>{{cite book |title=The India List and Office List |publisher=India Office |year=1905 |url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_3VQTAAAAYAAJ |page=[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_3VQTAAAAYAAJ/page/n556 552] |access-date=2011-11-21}}</ref> Both he and [[A. S. Lethbridge]], a surgeon in the IMS, concluded that the punishment of [[transportation]] to the [[Andaman Islands]] was failing to achieve the purpose intended and that indeed criminals preferred to go there rather than be incarcerated in Indian jails. Lyall and Lethbridge recommended that a "penal stage" should exist in the transportation sentence, whereby transported prisoners were subjected to a period of harsh treatment upon arrival. The outcome was the construction of the Cellular Jail, which has been described as "a place of exclusion and isolation within a more broadly constituted remote [[penal]] space."<ref>{{cite book |title=Isolation: places and practices of exclusion |first1=Carolyn |last1=Strange |first2=Alison |last2=Bashford |publisher=Routledge |location=London |year=2003 |isbn=978-0-415-30980-6 |pages=41–42 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=z72MP1zc4KgC |access-date=2011-11-22}}</ref>