By G SaravananPublished in The New Indian Express, Chennai on July 01, 2011:
Chennai: Thirty seven Indian convicts, including four women, who had been imprisoned in Colombo’s Welikada Prison for smuggling banned drugs into Sri Lanka, have appealed to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa to rescue them from the island nation’s jail under the Agreement on Transfer of Sentenced Prisoners between India and Sri Lanka.
The convicts have asked that they be shifted into any of Tamil Nadu’s prisons to complete the remainder of their sentences in India.
According to sources, the four-page letter, written by the 37 convicts and smuggled out of the prison some three weeks ago, had reached the Chief Minister’s office on Thursday through a citybased emissary.
Of the 37 prisoners, 30 are from different districts of Tamil Nadu while the remaining seven hail from the neighbouring state of Kerala.
According to a copy of the letter, which is available with Express, all the 37 Indian prisoners have begged Jayalalithaa for a new lease of life in Indian jails. The letter, undersigned by all the convicts, had reached the city-based human rights organisation Manitham recently with a request that the organisation hand over the convict’s plea to the Chief Minister’s office for immediate action.
According to Manitham’s executive director Agni Subramaniam, most of the Indian convicts in Welikada Prison had been imprisoned for more than 10 years and were living in agony in the foreign country.
Ever since the ‘Prisoners Exchange Treaty’ was entered into by India and Sri Lanka in June last year, they had been hoping to be relocated to Indian jails. But nothing had happened so far. Hence, this urgent plea to the Chief Minister, Subramaniam said.
The handwritten letter details the plight and mental agony faced by the convicts, stuck in a foreign country, where even their relatives can’t visit them.
Chennai: Thirty seven Indian convicts, including four women, who had been imprisoned in Colombo’s Welikada Prison for smuggling banned drugs into Sri Lanka, have appealed to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa to rescue them from the island nation’s jail under the Agreement on Transfer of Sentenced Prisoners between India and Sri Lanka.
The convicts have asked that they be shifted into any of Tamil Nadu’s prisons to complete the remainder of their sentences in India.
According to sources, the four-page letter, written by the 37 convicts and smuggled out of the prison some three weeks ago, had reached the Chief Minister’s office on Thursday through a citybased emissary.
Of the 37 prisoners, 30 are from different districts of Tamil Nadu while the remaining seven hail from the neighbouring state of Kerala.
According to a copy of the letter, which is available with Express, all the 37 Indian prisoners have begged Jayalalithaa for a new lease of life in Indian jails. The letter, undersigned by all the convicts, had reached the city-based human rights organisation Manitham recently with a request that the organisation hand over the convict’s plea to the Chief Minister’s office for immediate action.
According to Manitham’s executive director Agni Subramaniam, most of the Indian convicts in Welikada Prison had been imprisoned for more than 10 years and were living in agony in the foreign country.
Ever since the ‘Prisoners Exchange Treaty’ was entered into by India and Sri Lanka in June last year, they had been hoping to be relocated to Indian jails. But nothing had happened so far. Hence, this urgent plea to the Chief Minister, Subramaniam said.
The handwritten letter details the plight and mental agony faced by the convicts, stuck in a foreign country, where even their relatives can’t visit them.
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