In October 1990, riots broke out in New Delhi’s Tihar Jail, Asia’s largest prison, after an inmate died of alleged medical negligence. Thousands of prisoners were trying to blast prison walls with LPG cylinders in a bid to escape. Members of the VIII Battalion of the Tamil Nadu Special Police (TSP), deployed for external security at the prison, opened fire, leaving 10 inmates dead and about 200 injured. But how did the Tamil Nadu battalion come to be posted there? It began in the early 1980s, when the Ministry of Home Affairs had called in the TSP after 13 prisoners escaped, raising serious concerns about the security at Tihar Jail.
Cut to the present, impressed with their work, the Delhi jail administration has also brought the newly built Mandoli and Rohini prisons under the TSP security. More than 18,000 prisoners from various nations and States, with many involved in terrorism, drug-trafficking, and other notorious crimes, are lodged in the maximum security prison complex.
Language divide
It would be interesting to note why the Home Ministry preferred the TSP. After all, would not communication be an obstacle as a majority of the 1,000-plus personnel deployed neither speak nor understand Hindi? Was it not a wall within the walls to have such a large police contingent from a different political, ideological, and cultural background to work with a largely Hindi-speaking population?
Senior police officers say these factors were exactly the reasons for the TSP to be chosen as the first line of defence. In fact, the lack of interaction with inmates, because of the language divide, helped to prevent personal equations that could lead to corruption or bias. As the securitymen belong to a State with a different political culture, there would not be much scope for them to get affiliated to political bigwigs lodged in the prison or give them preferential treatment. The TSP has handled several high-profile under-trial prisoners or convicts, such as Afzal Guru, Yasin Bhatkal, Sukesh Chandrasekhar, and the accused persons in the Nirbhaya case.
Well equipped
The VIII Battalion men, posted on the outer periphery, at the main entrance, and in the high-security wards, are equipped with state-of-the-art scanners and metal detectors such as Magnetic Search Pole (MSP), Deep Ground Search Metal Detector, and Nonlinear Junction Detector. According to Mahesh Kumar Aggarwal, Director-General of Police, Armed Police, Tamil Nadu, correctional facilities play a vital role in reformation and rehabilitation of prisoners. Therefore, the security and safety of these institutions requires professionalism and ethical sensitivity.
The VIII Battalion has braved extreme weather conditions. In 2020, the State government granted the personnel winter allowance. “We deploy about 900 police personnel to guard 16 central prisons in Tihar, Mandoli, and Rohini. Live footage from dozens of surveillance cameras is monitored 24/7 from the control room, and the armed guards manning 35 watchtowers focussed on the high-security wards housing hardcore extremists, notorious gangsters, and foreign criminals. Quick Reaction Teams, comprising the Tamil Nadu Special Police, the Central Reserve Police Force, and the Indo-Tibetan Border Police, are stationed at vantage points to tackle any untoward incident in the prison complex,” says Mr. Aggarwal.
The intense patrolling and close monitoring along the perimeter of the 170-acre complex has resulted in a decline in prohibited items being smuggled into the jails or thrown in from outside. Many jail workers who tried to smuggle in contraband were also intercepted and action was taken against them. During 2021-24, 1,451 mobile phones, 86 kg of narcotic substances, ₹6.58 lakh in cash, and other banned items were recovered during surprise checks in the cells. When the Mandoli prison was established, the TSP were requested to train CRPF personnel in prison management.
At the receiving end
While it was bouquets for the good work done on many occasions, the TSP was at the receiving end, too, on some occasions. In May 2023, an explanation was sought from six police personnel who were present at the scene of a deadly attack on gangster Tillu Tajpuriya in a high-security block of Tihar Jail. The then DGP/Head of the Police Force, C. Sylendra Babu, asked them to explain why they had failed to intervene and restrain the prisoners from committing the murder. The gruesome killing was captured live on CCTV and the footage went viral on social media. Some inmates, alleged to be members of the rival Gogi gang, climbed down from the first floor of the prison using bed sheets and attacked Tajpuriya with crude weapons. The six police personnel replied that they had been carrying ‘lathis’, while the accused persons were armed with knives and grill rods.
The salaries and other expenses of the VIII Battalion are drawn from the Delhi prison budget. A commandant of the rank of Superintendent of Police heads the battalion with the assistance of a dozen deputy commandants and assistant commandants. With an impeccable record of excellence in guarding the high-security prison, the VIII Battalion is the jewel in the crown of the Tamil Nadu police.
