Bangalore, Dec 13: Whenever an undertrial makes good his escape, the axe invariably falls on the police escort party. But what the criticical public and the senior police officials fail to see is the reason behind such escapes, which have become far too frequent for comfort.
Well, it doesn’t require a trained eye to find out the reasons, but just a plain look at the problems nagging the police escort parties is telling. Topping the list of problems is the lack of custody rooms in the lower courts in the City which forces them to stand guard over undertrials for almost the entire day. Long working hours and inadequate transport facilities are some of the other problems they are facing. Drawn from the City Armed Reserve (CAR) police, the constables escort hundreds of undertrials from the Parappana Agrahara jail on the outskirts of the City to the Magistrates’ court at Mayo Hall on Residency Road and Nrupathunga Road and the City Civil Court at Mysore Bank Circle every day. But lack of custody rooms (a place in the court premises where the undertrials are housed till their hearing for the day is over) has forced the escort parties to keep the undertrials in the police vans itself.
A constable at the court on Nrupathunga Road told Deccan Herald, “Every day around 180 to 200 undertrials are brought to the court premises in the morning. At times the case of an undertrial is taken up in the afternoon and so we have to wait till it is over. As there is no holding area in the court premises, we have no other option than to confine them in the vans or keep them in the open. This is too risky as the undertrials may stealthily receive weapons, money and other contraband from their relatives or their associates.” In fact, the two dacoits who recently escaped by throwing chilli powder on the police party while being brought back from Channarayapatna court recently had received the powder in the same manner. Further, there are no fixed timings for producing undertrials. “The magistrate asks us to wait and while we do so, lawyers and relatives come to meet the undertrials and we cannot stop them. If we try to stop, fights break out between us and the lawyers. In fact, two days ago a verbal duel ensued between the lawyers and the constables in front of the chief judicial magistrate court and ultimately it was resolved following the intervention of the magistrate himself.”


Bureau Report