Bangalore: State Minister for Social Welfare and Prisons A Narayana Swami has said that most of the prisons in the state are packed to their fullest of capacity and are overcrowded.

The minister said so in the assembly in reply to a query from Dinesh Gundurao, Congress MLA. According to the minister there are over 5000 prisoners in the 101 prisons of the state and the seven central jails are packed to their full. If the Bangalore central prison can accommodate 2100 prisoners, at present it has 3972 under trials, while the Mangalore district prison has 283 under trials though it can accommodate only 150.

The minister also said the government was planning to initiate steps like construction of additional barracks, cells, construction of new prisons, additional toilets etc to solve the problem.