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dna exclusive: When in jail, family a call away for Sanjay Dutt

Telephone facility to start on trial basis at Yerawada Jail, where actor is to be lodged.

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If things go actor Sanjay Dutt’s way, he will be in touch with his family and lawyers over the phone after being lodged in Yerawada Jail. While Dutt has moved a special court seeking permission to surrender directly at Yerawada Jail, the state prisons department is planning to start a telephone facility in the jail for inmates.

The actor, convicted in the 1993 Mumbai blasts case, is supposed to surrender on Thursday.

The state prisons department last year proposed to the state home department provision of dedicated telephones in all 56 jails in the state. As per the proposal, convicts and undertrials will be able to talk to relatives at least twice a month. Delhi’s Tihar jail already has such a telephone facility.

Pune’s Yerawada Jail will be the first in the state to get the facility on a trial basis.

Confirming this, additional director general (state prisons) Meeran Chadha Borwankar told dna, “The state prisons department would start a telephone facility for inmates in jails.

Yerawada jail will be first in the state to have the facility on a trial basis. The service will be start soon with a tie-up with a service provider.”

A senior jail officer from Yerawada Jail told dna, “The telephone facility in Yerawada Jail will start soon. By that time, Dutt would be lodged in the jail. He would be able to keep in touch with his family and lawyers. But he would not be able to make frequent calls, as per the procedure. He can call them up at least twice a month. Moreover, we have all facilities there to lodge high-profile convicts and it is considered safe. Security has been beefed up in Yerawada Jail following the murder of suspected Indian Mujahideen operative Quateel Siddiquir.”

The officer added, “To get this facility, the prisoner will have to deposit a certain amount of money with us at the time of registration. They will have to submit two telephone numbers of their relatives. These numbers will be verified by the local police before they use the
facility.”

According to the sources, all the phones will be monitored by the jail officials and inmates will be under surveillance through closed-circuit television CCTV during the phone call. “If any inmate is found passing on information that could be used for illegal activities over the phone, appropriate action will be taken by the authorities,” the officer said.

There have been incidents of inmates smuggling cell phones into jails. On February 3, a murder convict was caught speaking on a cellphone inside the Adharwadi Jail in Kalyan.

Investigations by jail officials and Bazar Peth police station revealed that he had been using the phone for three days.

Telephone facility will reduce number of visitors to jail
The reason behind the proposal to start a telephone facility is to reduce the burden on the security apparatus. There are more than 2,000 convicts from across the country in state jails. Their kin and friends have to get registered with the jail officers before meeting them each time. A senior jail officer told dna that the telephone facility would help reduce the number of visits by prisoners’ relatives.

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