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10 in Andhra Pradesh jail-break

Syed Amin Jafri in Hyderabad

The police have launched a massive manhunt to nab 10 undertrials who escaped from Chittoor sub-jail in southern Andhra Pradesh on Sunday evening.

Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who held a high-level review meeting with Home Minister T Devender Goud and top police officials, announced a reward of Rs 100,000 to anyone providing information about each of the escaped prisoners.

The chief minister directed the police to launch full-scale search in Chittoor and neighbouring districts and co-ordinate with the police in neighbouring Karnataka and Tamil Nadu states, in nabbing the culprits.

The escape from the sub-jail in Cchittoor, Naidu's home district, has come as an embarrassment to the state government. Some prisoners were facing trial in connection with the murder of sub-inspector Prabhakar Raju, of Rallbuduguru police station, under Kuppam assembly constituency represented by Naidu, in 1997. They have been in jail for one year.

The jail-break came off at around 1600 hours IST on Sunday. The prisoners attacked the store room warden and sprinkled chilli powder on him. They then attacked the sentry of the jail superintendent and threw chilli powder on him too. They snatched his gun and scaled the wall of the grade II prison with a ladder.

The prisoners, K Ramakrishna, Yellappa, Ramana, Yerula Krishnappa, Ganganna, Erappa, Madhusudhan Raju, Hanmanthu, Chinnappa and Venkat Ramana, were involved in cases of dacoity, rape and murder in Chittoor district. They were facing trial at the Piler court.

District collector B V Satyanarayan Murthy, along with senior police officials, went to the sub-jail, after news of the jail-break came.

The police started combing operations to nab the prisons who were said to have escaped via the Bangalore-Madras bypass road. The police kept a vigil on roads and rail routes and raided suspected hideouts.

The injured sentry has been admitted to the government hospital at Chittoor.

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