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Belagavi: Two convicts injured in clash in Hindalga jail
Jail superintendent Krishnakumar said, “Both the prisoners were involved in an enmity since several months. To avoid such incidents, the jail staff had housed them in different cells”
Two prisoners lodged in Hindalga jail in Belagavi district in Karnataka were severely injured after a fight broke out between the two on Saturday evening, officials said on Sunday.
Murder convict Shankarappa Bajantri, a resident of Hubballi, who has been lodged in the jail since four-and-a-half-years allegedly attacked Sayikumar, another murder convict and habitual offender from Mandya district, one of the officials quoted above added.
“Sayikumar was severely injured and sustained injuries in the head and ear”, added the officials on anonymity. “Bajantri and Sayikumar were in a physical fight and were punching each other. Bajantri later attacked Sayikumar with a nail,” a jail staff familiar with the matter said.
Confirming the development, jail superintendent Krishnakumar said, “Both the prisoners were involved in an enmity since several months. To avoid such incidents, the jail staff had housed them in different cells”.
However, “during their open time”— when the inmates can move freely in the campus — both were involved in a verbal altercation. “In a fit of rage , Bajantri took out a nail he had kept hidden in his cloth and attacked Sayikumar,” said the superintendent.
Bajantri might have “pre-planned the attack as he brought a nail with him to attack Sayikumar”, Krishnakumar said, adding that they were later rushed to the hospital inside the jail where they were given the first aid and medicine. They were later shifted to the government hospital in Belagavi.
Krishnakumar added that Bajantri who was earlier lodged in Dharwad and Ballari jail and has a record “of indulging in such incidents to drag the attention with an intention to get shifted to a better jail”. “According to his earlier profile, similar cases have been reported against him, either in a jail or hospital...he did such things,” he said. Apart from being convicted in a murder case, he has been lodged as an under trial in two to three cases, he added.
While Sayikumar, according to jailer Krishnakumar, was a habitual offender who has also been convicted under murder charges, the accused “is also facing cases like dacoity, road robbery, illegal sand mining attempt to murder etc”. For being involved in such activities he has been shifted to Belagavi jail from Bengaluru and Tumakuru jails, the jailer said.
The jail has filed a complaint with Belagavi Rural police into the matter.
