15 jail inmates sentenced capital punishment for clash inside Jamshedpur jail

In an unprecedented judgement pronounced in Jamshedpur court, 15 persons have been sentenced to capital punishment and seven others sentenced to 10 years rigorous imprisonment on Thursday.

The court of additional district judge IV – Rajendra Kumar Sinha pronounced the sentence against the 22 convicts, all prisoners lodged in the Ghaghidih Central Jail pertaining to a bloody group clash taken place inside the central jail in June 2019.

Those sentenced to the capital punishment are Basudev Mahto, Anup Kumar Bose, Jani Ansari, Ajay Mallah, Gopal Tiria, Pinku Purti, Shyamu Jojo, Sanjay Tiggi, Shivashankar Paswan, Rameshwar Angaria, Ganga Khandayat, Ramai Karua, Sarad Gope and Sriram Angadia.

In the group clash which occurred amidst the prisoners in the evening of June 26, 2019, two undertrial prisoners were injured, one of them identified as Manoj Singh fatally.

Two of the convicts, Sriram Angadia and Ramai Karua are still absconding, and the court has instructed the director general of police, Jharkhand to apprehend them as soon as possible.

Revealing about the term of sentence, assistant public prosecutor (APP) Rajiv Kumar said that a case had been registered with the Parsudih thana on the FIR lodged by the then central jail superintendent, Satyendra Chaudhury against 17 prisoners, including the undertrials for indulging in the group clash that resulted in the death of one of the undertrials.

Kumar said there were in all 15 prosecution witnesses, including Sumit Kumar Singh who survived despite sustaining grievous injuries.

The APP said the capital punishment was pronounced for hatching criminal conspiracy and inflicting fatal injuries by using hard and blunt substances inside the prison.

According to the prosecution sources, the clash between the jail inmates was triggered following the alleged high-handedness of one the undertrial prisoners, Harish Singh in sequel to using the landline telephone from the jail. Later the issue of using the landline telephone had turned into a clash between the jail inmates who were divided as supporters of gangsters Pankaj Dubey and Harish Singh.

According to the prosecution, Manoj Singh succumbed to his injuries while being taken to MGM medical college hospital along with Sumit Kumar Singh by the jail administration immediately after the clash had taken place.