God angry over Tihar reports

The Hell Area Development Authority (HADA) has strongly reacted to recent reports appearing in newspapers comparing conditions in Tihar Jail to hell. Spokesperson for Indian affairs Mr Chitragupta Shrivastava said HADA would seek legal course of action if Indian media continued comparing the godforsaken Tihar Jail with Hell, the heavenly prison.

"The comparison with Tihar is giving a bad name to Hell. Tihar is not just pathetic it's ridiculous," he said. Mr Chitragupta, known for his sense of humour, hurried to add: "And by the way we don't have murderers escaping all the time" hinting at the Sher Singh Rana escape from Tihar.

"Living conditions in hell are far superior to those in Tihar Jail. Though we admit that sometimes two or three people have to share a cell, the Hell will never come down to the level of Tihar. The reports spread a fallacy and it must stop," he said.

He said God too was furious at the aspersions cast by the Indian media. "We do not want to make false claims but inquiry committees on earth itself have detailed how bad the situation in Tihar," he told a crowded press conference flashing a copy of a report.

"This is not our inquiry. A special commission of inquiry, appointed after the 1995 death of Rajan Pillai, has said that the 10,000 inmates held in Tihar endured serious health hazards, including overcrowding, appalling sanitary facilities, and a shortage of medical staff," Mr Chitragupta said.

said we have no shortage of doctors; some really good ones end up here. "And our sanitary conditions are better than many five star hotels down there, hello. And how does one compare the Tihar mess with our swanky cafeteria?"

"This is a deliberated attempt to destroy our image. And we shall not sit silent, not any more. We haven't forgotten the days when civilised people even on that scum of an earth used to meet and say Hello to each other. Now they say hi. Everybody thinks there's something wrong with hell because of negative publicity," Narada Mooni, Information and Broadcasting Minister in the Heavenly regime, said.

"Hell is a punishment place in the sense that it doesn't have centralised air-conditioning like heaven does. But we do have decent air coolers. We do not believe in torture. Punishment too must have compassion. We recently stopped screening Guddu Dhanoa-directed films here, because it was too harsh on them. We have discontinued the use of Kumar Sanu songs too. We are alive to the problems of the dead," he explained.

He attributed the overcrowding is jail to the worsening law and order situation on earth. "There are so many killings and rapes happening on earth that we have difficulty accommodating all of them. And we have been working on constructing more living space," he said.

HADA has recently signed an MoU with Swarg Residents Welfare Association (SRWA) to take over large parts of heavenly lands, lying unused for years.

SRWA spokeswoman Pavitra Paapiya confirmed the HADA claims. "Occupancy has been falling this side of the town for quite some time. Maintaining these large real estate costs hell of a lot of money. Looking at the rate of criminal sins committed down there, we do not expect many people in near future. So we have decided to lease out Sectors 5 to 15 to HADA."