The State government has notified a borstal school inside the Puzhal prison complex in Chennai as a special camp to lodge 125 foreign nationals, including 12 women, who had attended the Tablighi Jamaat conference in Delhi and had subsequently preached Islamic values in Tamil Nadu. They were arrested under provisions of the Foreigners Act, 1946, for violating conditions of their tourist visas.
The Prison Department has handed over control of the borstal school to the Chennai district administration for setting up infrastructure for the special camp. The foreign nationals are currently lodged in the Saidapet sub-jail in Chennai. Six foreigners who had been released on bail have been moved to the special camp, DGP (Prisons) Sunil Kumar Singh told The Hindu.
Many of them were not conversant in English or any Indian language. This was delaying their bail application process. Only a few advocates had met the foreigners, and no representative from any of their respective embassies had entered the scene yet, since a foreigner meeting a foreigner would require permission from the government of India, Mr. Singh said.
A special camp in Tiruchi, which houses around 70 Sri Lankan nationals, is being renovated to increase capacity, and hence, it was decided to keep the foreigners linked to Tablighi Jamaat in Chennai till the new camp is ready for full occupancy.
On complaints of space constraints in the Saidapet sub-jail, Mr. Singh said the facility had the capacity to accommodate 150 persons, whereas only 121 were currently lodged there. “The sub-jail is a spacious campus with adequate water supply and other amenities for the inmates. There has not been a single complaint from any of the prisoners on the inadequacy of any facility,” he said.
While an Indian coordinator of the Tablighi Jamaat was released on conditional bail, 11 Bangladeshi nationals were quarantined in a hospital in Poonamallee, after two of them tested positive for COVID-19.
Prison officials were closely monitoring the health of all foreigners, and round-the-clock ambulance and medical facilities were available in case of any emergency, he added.
