A timely alert by school girl helped authorities foil jail break bid by a few inmates at the Shahid Khudi Ram Bose Central Jail of Muzaffarpur in the nick of time on Sunday evening.
Talking to the media persons, jail superintendent Rajiv Kumar said five inmates were found missing on Sunday evening. “We launched a search operation immediately. While it was under way, we got a call from a woman, who had seen two men climbing down from the inner boundary wall of the prison. She told us those men were hiding in a ditch full with water inside the campus. Both were apprehended from there. They revealed names of there more inmates who were about the flee from the jail,” he said.
Four jail staff members, including a head warden, have been suspended and another head warden has been issued show cause for security lapse, Kumar said.
“Head warden Narendra Singh, wardens Ramesh Rai, Sanjiv Kumar and Pradeep Singh have been put on suspension with immediate effect while head warden Harendra Shamra has been served a show cause notice. Sharma has to file his response within a week,” said the jail superintendent.
Giving details of the role played by the girl, a class XI student, Kumar said she was taking a stroll on the roof of her house in the vicinity around 8 pm when she spotted two men climbing down from main wall of the jail and then crawling into a ditch full with water.
“I informed my mother and father about it. My mother informed one of the jail officials who she knows. In the meantime, some other locals also raised an alarm, which helped jail authorities,” said the girl.