Cpvid-19: Do not send any new prisoners, Taloja jail authorities urges

The Taloja Central Jail authorities have appealed to the city sessions courts, and other lower courts in Mumbai and its suburban districts, to not send any new prisoners

The Taloja Central Jail authorities have appealed to the city sessions courts, and other lower courts in Mumbai and its suburban districts, to not send any new prisoners to the jail and instead to grant them bail. The letter from Taloja jail authorities on April 1, 2020 comes after prisons in Mumbai and Thane stopped admitting new prisoners due to overcrowding and the imminent threat of COVID-19 virus. At Taloja prison, every new prisoner is kept in the isolation ward to quarantine for the required period of a fortnight which has seen that the jail’s capacity to hold more prisoners come down, a senior police officer said.

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“All the prisons from Arthur Road, Byculla, Thane Central prison and Aadharwadi at Kalyan stopped taking new prisoners, and hence all the prisoners were being sent to Taloja. We have been receiving 10 to 15 new prisoners every day, and now we do not have the facility to accommodate all of them. So we have requested the courts to not send more prisoners to Taloja, and to let the accused go on bail if the offence is not grave in nature,” said the officer.