MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of Madras High Court on Tuesday directed the Principal District Judge, Tiruchy to visit Tiruchy Central Prison, conduct an inquiry and file a report, into the alleged assault of a convict prisoner by the prison officials recently.
The court called for a similar report from the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Tiruchy, who already conducted an inquiry in the matter.
A bench of justices AD Jagadish Chandira and R Poornima gave the directions on a habeas corpus petition filed by M Angammal, mother of the convict M Harikarasudhan.
According to Angammal, Harikarasudhan was convicted in a ganja case and sentenced to 14 years imprisonment last year. Initially, he was lodged in Madurai Central Prison, where he completed Class X and had applied for ITI course. For this, he was transferred to the Tiruchy Central Prison six months ago.
On July 26, when his son was lying in his prison cell, a deputy jailer attacked him with a lathi and soon other prison officials also jointly assaulted him, resulting in several injuries, Angammal alleged. Her son had shown his injuries to an advocate who visited him in jail two days later.
Since then prison staff have kept him in solitary confinement without giving treating to his injuries, she alleged and sought direction to the authorities to produce his son before the court to provide him necessary medical treatment. Also, she sought action against prison officials who allegedly assaulted her son.
The judges called for the above reports and adjourned the case to August 7. Four convicts including Harikarasudhan have been booked on charges of assaulting a deputy jailor.