A prisoner who escaped from the Central Prison at Poojappura in Thiruvananthapuram earlier this month surrendered before a local court in the district on Saturday, September 18. Forty-eight-year-old Jahir Hussain, a native of Tamil Nadu’s Thoothukudi, told the court while surrendering that he escaped from prison to meet his family back in Tamil Nadu.
Jahir, who is convicted for murder, was found missing from the jail campus on September 7. According to a Times of India report, he told the Additional Chief Magistrate Court that he had not met his family, which is based in Tamil Nadu, in a very long time and that he escaped from prison to meet them.
“He surrendered at the Chief Judicial Magistrate Court here. After completing the court proceedings, he will be remanded and brought back to the prison,” a police officer told PTI. Though there were reports that his wife and son accompanied him to the court, police did not confirm it, PTI reported.
Jahir had escaped from the high security central jail when he was brought out of his cell for routine work. Though the Prison Department and local police had launched a massive manhunt in the city and outskirts to trace the absconding inmate, it did not yield any result. Imprisoned for life in a murder case reported in the state capital, Jahir had been lodged in the Poojappura prison since 2017.
In April 2017, an inmate who had escaped from another prison in Thiruvananthapuram district had similarly surrendered. However, according to the police, the man, a native of West Bengal, returned to the prison after three days as he was hungry. Abdul Razaq had been convicted for theft and lodged in the Nettukaltheri Open Jail. He had reportedly escaped from the jail just after the prison warden had seized a mobile phone from him.
(With PTI inputs)