Take action against negligent prison officials: Anbumani

PMK president Dr. Anbumani Ramadoss on Tuesday demanded that all the prisoners who escaped from a district jail in Theni district be apprehended and action be taken against the negligent prison officials.

In a statement, he said that an investigation should be launched to ascertain whether there was a conspiracy or a plan behind this prison escape. “Scenes of prisoners escaping from jail, which were previously seen only in films, are now becoming a reality. This is deeply concerning,” he said.

“It reflects the weakening of the administration of departments such as the police and the prisons department, which are responsible for maintaining law and order and ensuring security. The fact that 17 prisoners escaped simultaneously after assaulting the prison staff cannot be treated as an ordinary incident. It exposes a serious failure on the part of the prisons department,” he said.

Tamil Nadu Congress Committee president and Virudhunagar M.P., B. Manickam Tagore, sought to point out that similar incidents have taken place in the past, and said that intensive reforms are needed in suburban and rural jails.

He recalled how in during the DMK regime, a prisoner named Riyaz Khan escaped when he was being transported by bus to Vellore in 2023, a lifer escaped from Tiruchi Central Jail and a history sheeter named Balamurugan repeatedly escaped from police custody, a prisoner escaped near Perundurai while being transported from Salem to Coimbatore, and 12 individuals fled after assaulting guards at the Chengalpattu high-security facility.

“Upon closely examining all these previous incidents, it becomes clear that basic infrastructure is weak in the Tamil Nadu Prison Department, particularly in suburban and rural jails. Immediate systematic structural changes and intensive reforms are urgently needed in rural jails,” he said.

He further said that the Tamil Nadu government must conduct an inquiry into the senior officials who failed to properly monitor the prison department and thereby paved the way for such security breakdowns and take departmental action without bias.