The minister further said in a statement that of the total number of prisoners, those under trial amounted to 250,204, or 66.4 percent of all inmates.
Uttar Pradesh tops the list with 62 prisons packed with 59,058 men and women facing trial.
As per the government records Maharashtra has the highest number of jails (213) followed by Andhra Pradesh (141) and Tamil Nadu (134).
Maharashtra houses 16,180 prisoners and Delhi which has 10 jails have 8,931 inmates.
The minister also informed the House that the government has initiated a scheme for the prisons across the country to keep the prisoners in healthy and hygienic conditions.
The scheme includes increasing the number of prisons, renovating the existing ones, providing better sanitation facilities to the inmates and building accommodation facilities for the jail staff.
