Tihar Prison Security Fails Again

Mangalore Today News Network

New Delhi, March 15 :’High security’ Tihar prison fails for second time in four days as another inmate is found hanged in her cell

In yet another alleged suicide at Delhi’s high-security Tihar Jail, a 30-year-old woman facing kidnapping charges was found hanging in her cell on Thursday afternoon.

The second such incident in four days – after the mysterious death of December 16 gang-rape accused Ram Singh on Monday – shows jail authorities have failed to improve security in the prison.

The female inmate, identified as Reshma, was found hanging in ward No. six of Tihar, when two other inmates of her cell were out on work.

Director general (prisons) Vimla Mehra, who is under tremendous pressure after the death of Ram Singh, set up another in-house committee to probe this incident.

Tihar authorities have also requested a judicial magistrate to probe the death.

The woman, who had been in Tihar since November 2011, was rushed to Deen Dayal Upadhyay hospital after she was found. Doctors declared her dead on arrival.

"She was alone in her cell of ward number 6… She was taking medicine for depression," said Sunil Gupta, Tihar’s public relations officer.

He said no CCTV cameras are installed in the ward.

"Her post-mortem would be conducted at a hospital. The body would be handed over to her family only after the court’s order as she was an undertrial," he said.

On Monday, Ram Singh, one of the six men accused in the gang-rape case, allegedly committed suicide in his cell by hanging himself.

Singh’s family and lawyers, however, insist he was murdered.

Four of his co-defendants were reportedly shifted to cells with CCTV surveillance in the wake of the incident.

Union home minister Sushilkumar Shinde has termed the death of Ram Singh a security lapse that puts "a question mark on the functioning of Tihar jail".

Twenty-two people have ended their lives in south Asia’s largest prison during the last decade.

Meanwhile, the Tihar Jail authorities informed a Delhi court that their internal probe into Ram Singh’s death was still on.