West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Friday, May 15, displayed 23 cellphones that had been seized from inmates lodged inside the Presidency Correctional Home.
Calling it a “deep nexus between custodians of the correctional home, criminals, and a section of politicians,” Adhikari suspended the Superintendent of Presidency Correctional Home, N Kujur, and Chief Controller Dipta Gharai.
“Criminals across the state are continuing to run criminal networks from inside jail. This practice has been going on for years. Corruption has spread from the bottom to the top levels. We will not let criminals run their network from jails in Bengal. We also want to send out a message to jail authorities that action will be taken in case of any negligence. This nexus runs deep, and it will take some time to weed it out, but we will not allow the likes of Sheikh Shahjahan to run their networks from inside the correctional homes,” Adhikari said.
Sheikh Shahjahan, a Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader from Sandeshkhali in Sunderbans, was arrested after being on the run for 55 days following an assault on a team of Enforcement Directorate officials who had gone to raid his home in connection with the public distribution scam in West Bengal.
He was named as the prime accused in land-grabbing, several counts of assault, and sexual exploitation of women cases.
Ten police teams conducted coordinated raids inside the Presidency Jail late Thursday night following complaints that inmates were using smartphones to maintain contact with outside criminal networks. The operation was carried out jointly by Kolkata Police and correctional authorities in the presence of senior officials and a senior police officer.
The Chief Minister also claimed that similar activities were taking place in several correctional homes across West Bengal, including prisons in Dum Dum and Berhampore.
Adhikari has ordered the case to be transferred to the Criminal Investigation Department (CID).
“The agency will investigate who supplied the mobile phones to inmates, in whose names the SIM cards were registered, and whether prison officials were directly involved in facilitating the network,” he said.
According to him, the investigators would also examine call records and identify individuals who communicated with the inmates using the recovered phones. “Those who called these numbers will also be probed,” Adhikari stated.