Qasab causes more suffering

At Arthur Road Jail, Mohammed Ajmal Qasab gets the use of air-conditioners, security, water coolers, new flooring and freshly painted walls. For the other inmates who have been shifted to the newly-constructed Taloja, the prison staff guarding them, and visitors to the inmates, the shift has become a nightmare.

Visitors to the jail, often women and children of the inmates, are shocked at the lack of amenities. Each visitor has to wait outside the jail for a couple of hours before they are allowed to meet an inmate. This wait is under the full heat of the sun, with no shelter, no bathroom facilities and not even a provision for water.

Taloja does not have proper water supply, power, transport or medical facilities.

Over 100-odd undertrials lodged at Arthur Road jail were moved out to Taloja to accommodate Qasab. Nearly 800 undertrials are at the Taloja prison, and work there is moving at a snail's pace.

Located approximate 48 km from Mumbai, Taloja prison is spread on 27 acres (approximate 2,70,000 sq meter areas) of land leased for a period of 65 years by CIDCO. Work on the over Rs 50 crore worth project started by the Public Works Department (PWD).

Work started in three phases in 1996, to shift inmates from the overcrowded Byculla, Arthur Road, Thane and Kalyan jails.

Approved plans include a huge kitchen, RMO quarters, a 40-bed hospital, administrative building, residential quarters for prison staff, a rest room outside the jail, a patrol road and five watch towers. All of these are structures are leak-proof and earthquake resistant upto a magnitude of 8' in the Richter scale.
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These are the plans on paper, however. Projected-affected villagers from Taloja, Owe and Dhaisar gaon initially prevented contract labourers from reporting to work. The other set-back was because of the rise in cement and steel prices. Frequent load shedding resulted in further delay.

When contacted DIG Prisons Rajnish Seth confirmed that few inmates from Arthur Road were indeed shifted to Taloja and that they were taking possession of the prison in a phased manner.