Skip to main content

A Village Burnt Overnight: Tears, Loss and Survival in Dhamangaon Blaze

  Sitting amid the blackened remains of his home, 32-year-old Nikesh Gawali carefully broke open a half-melted plastic box with a screwdriver. His hands shook slightly, not out of fear, but out of hope. “I’m trying to find my daughter Aarti’s gold earrings,” he said quietly, still focused on the box. “She’s just five. I got them made recently after months of labour work.” The plastic box, warped and blackened by heat, was one of the few things left from his two-room house on the outskirts of Dhamangaon village . All around him lay ash, broken tin sheets and charred wooden beams. The walls had cracked under the heat and the front room’s tin roof had caved in completely. What remained was a blackened debris all around - almost nothing to suggest a home once stood there. Nikesh earns his living as an agricultural labourer, like many in the village. Work is uncertain and depends on the season. Those earrings weren’t just jewellery - they were a small dream, a reward for his hard work,...

‘Jail Wapsi’ : Police catches 62 prisoners released on parole during Covid pandemic


The Nagpur City police have caught 62 prisoners of Central Jail who did not return to the jail despite their parole period being over. These prisoners were released by the State on parole in 2020 to decongest jails during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Commissioner of Police (CP) Amitesh Kumar said that the special operation was conducted to catch these prisoners released on parole. The list of such prisoners was procured from the Central Jail and all police station officers were tasked to catch the prisoners. The police staff visited the residences of these prisoners and took them into the jail.

“We have managed to catch 62 prisoners who were not returned to jail despite their parole period being over. Ten such prisoners are yet to be caught,” he said, adding that some of them are ailing and bed-ridden.

The police have prepared a list of 48 prisoners whose parole will be over this month. The concerned police station officers have been tasked to send the prisoner back to jail on the last day of his parole.

Parole is given to a prisoner for a specific reason like the death of a relative or to attend the marriage of a family member, and is subject to the prisoner’s behaviour. When the Covid-19 cases started surging across the State in 2020, the Home Department had issued guidelines to the jail administration to release the prisoners on parole to decongest the jail. Whopping 11,000 prisoners were released on parole after the orders. The parole period was extended by the jail administration from time to time during the second and third wave. On May 5, the Home Department issued orders to stop extending the parole period after which the police swung into action.

493 absconding in East Vidarbha

An officer of Central Jail said that a total of 493 prisoners from Nagpur city and district, Bhandara, Gondia, Chandrapur and Gadchiroli districts were absconding after their parole period was over. The police administration of the concerned district have been informed about it, the official said.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

IGP Prasanna : The man who stopped Obama’s convoy

IGP Mallikarjuna Prasanna By Dheeraj Fartode  Published on Feb/17/2019 NOT many are aware of an episode during the then US President Barack Obama’s visit to India in 2010. The world’s most powerful man was made to wait for 11 minutes in his car while an Indian cop took on American officials for their unwarranted interference in the US President’s security. KM Mallikarjuna Prasanna, Special Inspector General of Police of Nagpur Range, still continues to work with the same pride, wearing his patriotism on the sleeve. “Had they (Americans) deployed their personnel for area security, then the message would have been Indians are unable to protect VIPs in their nation,” recounted Prasanna on the episode that is one of the highlights of his distinguished career of a skillful investigator. The story of the IPS officer of 2000 batch is worth a film. In fact, a movie (Nagarjun-starrer ‘Officer’) has already been made by Ram Gopal Verma last year. His real life script als...

DCP Sunil Kolhe gets IPS cadre

DCP (crime) Sunil Kolhe By Dheeraj Fartode About 28 State Police Service (SPS) officers were granted  Indian Police Service (IPS) cadre on Monday. At Nagpur, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) (Crime) Sunil Kolhe is among these officers. With their promotion, Maharashtra Government will fill-up the existing vacancies of cadre posts across the State. The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), Government of India, approved the promotion and Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), issued the notification of 28 state police officers into IPS cadre.  Maharashtra Government had earlier empanelled the 28 officers for promotion of SPS officers into IPS and criteria was they should have served for atleast eight years as Superintendent of Police (SP) or Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP). The list includes names of officers belonging to Deputy Superintendent of Police (Dy.SP) batches between 1988 and 1995, who were promoted to the IPS cadre. The officers are S V Ja...

How a mom won fight for justice after 15 years

Pintu Shirke  THE love of a mother can move mountains. But for Vijaya Dilipsingh Shirke the task ahead was much tougher. She was taking on the mountain of a corrupt system, enduring threats to life, and fighting the might of muscle power. Never did she flinch even once, and after a longdrawn legal battle of 15 years ensured that the killers of her son did not go unpunished. After all, it was a resolute mother’s promise to her  slain son. On October 31, 2017 the mother was full of anxiety waiting for a word about the outcome of hearing in the Apex Court. The decision would have a bearing on the Shirkes’ years of struggle to get justice for their slain son Swapnil alias Pintu Shirke. When the learned Apex Court judges threw out challenge of main culprits, including prime plotter Vijay Mate, and upheld life sentence handed out by the High Court, the 15-yearlong fight of Vijaya Shirke had finally reached its logical conclusion. “The promise made to Swapnil when...