Tihar jail officials allege Satyendar Jain threatened them in prison

The jail superintendent has put the matter on record in an “incident report”, which has been sent to the top authorities, senior prison officials aware of the matter said on Thursday.

New Delhi: Tihar Jail officials have accused Delhi minister Satyendar Jain of threatening them when they had gone to serve a show cause notice to him on December 8 even as the Delhi government rejected the charges as “bogus and imaginary”.

Jain is currently lodged in jail number 7 of Tihar prisons. The minister was arrested on May 30 in connection with an alleged money laundering case. (HT Photo)

Jain is currently lodged in jail number 7 of Tihar prisons. The minister was arrested on May 30 in connection with an alleged money laundering case.

The jail superintendent has put the matter on record in an “incident report”, which has been sent to the top authorities, senior prison officials aware of the matter said on Thursday.

“The jail superintendent requested that the matter be put on record so that he is not harassed post his superannuation in 2024. The additional inspector general(AIG) has agreed to this and put the matter on record,” said a prison officer, who asked not to be named.

Delhi prisons come under the administrative jurisdiction of the state government’s home department. Until his arrest on May 30, Jain was the minister of prisons.

According to the report filed by superintendent of jail 7 Rajesh Chaudhary, assistant superintendent Jaidev(identified only by his first name), deputy superintendent Praveen Kumar and other officers had gone inside Jain’s cell to issue a show cause notice to him.

The notice was related to punishment for alleged violation of prison rules by Jain.

The incident report said, “On seeing the show cause notice, undertrial prisoner Satyendar Jain said, ‘I know the law officer is behind this. After I am released, I will get the CCTV footage from jail, transfer Rajesh Chaudhary and teach him how to do his job.”

HT has seen a copy of the incident report.

A Delhi government spokesperson all the allegations levelled against Jain in the report are false. He added that the the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) got the prison officials to write the report containing bogus allegations in order to influence the court hearing on the bail petition moved by the Delhi minister.

According to the report, Chaudhary said Jain had threatened him on November 25 too, when he was questioning him as part of an inquiry. “This is a political case. When I am released, I will take action against all serving and retired officers, who spoke against me,” Jain told Chaudhary, according to the incident report.

In the complaint, Chaudhary said he initially thought Jain said this out of frustration. But, in view of the December 8 incident, he apprehended that being a minister Jain may take adverse action against him and other jail officials, once he is released.

The Delhi government and the Aam Aadmi Party did not respond to calls and text messages.

Jain’s detention in Tihar in the alleged money laundering case has become a subject of intense political controversy, with a series of videos leaked in November showing him receiving massages, being served food in his cell, and having his room cleaned by some inmates. Then then prison chief Sandeep Goel was suspended last month in the case.

The AAP has accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of leaking prison footage and weaving a false narrative. It said that videos were part of a physiotherapy session because Jain was injured after falling in the bathroom last year.

A three-member committee that probed allegations of prison rule violations by jail said that the inquiry revealed jail officers forced prisoners to give special favours to Jain by circumventing the jail rules. Three senior Delhi bureaucrats – principal secretary (law), principal secretary (vigilance), and principal secretary (home) – were part of the panel formed in early November. The panel had said that Jain received massage from fellow prisoners, food from outside, and met his wife “in restricted places” in Tihar jail. The Delhi government had dismissed the report and questioned its legal validity.

The AAP has said that the formation of the committee and its findings were not according to law.

ED arrested Jain in May under the prevention of money laundering act (PMLA). The central agency’s probe is based on a 2017 case of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), in which the AAP leader and his wife Poonam Jain were accused of amassing disproportionate assets worth ₹1.47 crore between February 2015 and May 2017, which was 217% more than their known sources of income. The agency has also alleged that Jain set up shell companies to launder money between 2011 and 2016.

Jain has denied the allegations, and the AAP has described CBI and ED action as a “political vendetta”.