Set up separate prisons for terrorists: Home Min

 

New Delhi, 02 May 2015: The Home Ministry has asked all states to set up new secure prisons outside cities for exclusively housing terrorists and said if this is not feasible, movement of high-risk prisoners should be restricted inside jails to keep them from indoctrinating other prisoners.

 

Such measures need "serious consideration for being implemented on priority" based on the current security challenges faced by the jail administrations of various states, joint secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs, Kumar Alok, has said in a letter to the principal secretaries of all states on April 28. This could be the first move in India to segregate terrorists and place them outside city limits.

 

High-profile terrorists like 26/11 accused Mohammad Ajmal Kasab and Parliament attack accused Mohammad Afzal were kept in the Mumbai’s Arthur Road Jail and Delhi’s Tihar Jail respectively, albeit in solitary confinement in high-security cells, before being hanged.

 

"There is immediate need to decongest the jails by setting up security prison for terror accused outside the city. If that is not feasible, then very high-risk prisoners and other undertrial prisoners under the category of terrorist/security suspects are required to be segregated effectively from the ordinary prisoners within the complex of central and district jails," the letter says. It adds, "(There must be) restriction on movement of high-risk prisoners within the jails and their mixing with other prisoners even during transit to court, hospital etc to avoid the chance of indoctrination."

 

The ministry also asked for strict monitoring of activities of visitors inside the jails. It also said that arrangements should be made of court’s hearing through videoconferencing in case of high-risk prisoners - prompted probably by the encounter in Telangana last month when five alleged terrorists were killed in crossfire by cops who were escorting them in a police van from Warangal jail to a Hyderabad court. It also pressed for installation of CCTV cameras, mobile jammers with state-of-the-art prison surveillance system and enforcement of a regular security classification protocol for screening and risk assessment of prisoners so that the level of security within a prison is categorised in terms of risk to prisoners.