Jail row: Sasikala indeed had special facilities, say officials

BENGALURU: Senior officers of the Prisons Department have admitted before members of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the legislature that special privileges were indeed extended to AIADMK leader V.K. Sasikala and multi-crore stamp paper scam kingpin Abdul Karim Telgi inside the Parappana Agrahara Central Jail, PAC sources told Deccan Chronicle.

The prison officials, who appeared before the committee on Friday, admitted that both the convicts received special treatment and that Ms Sasikala had a passage and five rooms entirely for herself. Former minister and senior BJP leader R. Ashok is the chairman of the committee, which is reviewing prison reforms in the state.

The irregularities came to the fore last week when former DIG (Prisons) D. Roopa Moudgil submitted a report to the Home Secretary and other four departments, accusing former DIG&IGP (Prisons) H.N. Satyanarayana Rao of receiving Rs 2 crore as kickback to extend special privileges to Ms Sasikala. Following the accusations, the state government had ordered a high-level inquiry under Vinay Kumar, a retired IAS officer.

The PAC has, however, asked both ADGP (Prisons) N.S. Megharikh and DIG (Prisons) H.S. Revanna, who have replaced Mr Rao and Ms Moudgil in the prison, to submit a detailed report.

“So far, the allegation regarding special treatment meted out to Sasikala and Telgi, as mentioned in the report submitted by Roopa turns out to be true. Our committee has directed the senior officials to identify those jail officials who are involved in the irregularities,” a committee member told Deccan Chronicle.

Meanwhile, Mr Vinay Kumar is expected to submit the preliminary inquiry report to the government in a day or two.