Suspended after Tajpuriya murder: Why Tamil Nadu cops were deployed at Tihar jail

Why is Asia’s biggest jail guarded by officers from a state over 2,400 kilometres away?

The answer lies in a 1976 jail break that was a big embarrassment to the Delhi establishment.

Thirteen inmates, who had been awarded the life sentence by courts, managed to dig a tunnel under the boundary wall of the jail complex and escape to freedom in March 1976.

“When records were checked, it came to the fore that all the convicts were from Haryana. At the time, most of the jail staff and the superintendent were also from the same state. Questions about the complicity of the officers in the escape were raised,” said Sunil Gupta, who was the law officer and spokesperson for Tihar between 1981 and 2016.

He said that a need to create a distance between the inmates and the guards was then felt.

“Because most of the prisoners in Tihar were from Delhi and states such as Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, it was decided that a request would be made to the Centre to intervene and provide staff from another state, especially a state where Hindi and its dialects were not spoken commonly,” said a former Tihar jail official who did not want to be named.

Police personnel from other states are often roped in to conduct elections too, for similar reasons. For instance, for the upcoming Karnataka polls, a PIB press release says that “based on the assessment of the ground situation, Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) and State Armed Police (SAP) drawn from other States will be deployed during the election.”

Why was Tamil Nadu the state chosen for Tihar?

Gupta said Delhi had no hand in this decision. “Authorities wrote to the Centre explaining the issue and requesting that a force from a different state be provided. Factors such as availability of forces, discipline and performance are likely to have been kept in mind while taking the final decision,” he said.

The first batch of officers from the Tamil Nadu Special Force joined Tihar in the early 1980s.

The Tamil Nadu Special Force, however, is not the only security agency deployed at Tihar. The Central Reserve Police Force (CRFP) and jail staff are also deployed.

Sources said that officers are routinely shifted from one jail to another — Tihar, Rohini and Mandoli — and many serve in Delhi jails for around two years.

However, in recent years, questions of collusion have still been raised at Tihar. Cases of corruption and violence have emerged, such as the murder of gangster Prince Tewatia in April and bribery allegations in the case of conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar.