Arrested on charges of murder, a 24-year-old undertrial died after trying to make good his escape through a manhole in the District Jail of Aligarh on Tuesday.
After his body was recovered from the manhole, jail authorities refused to admit that it was a case of death while escaping the jail and suspected that the deceased could have committed suicide.
As per reports, Monu Kumar of Hathras was lodged in Aligarh district jail since November 13 for the murder of a woman. The jail inmate had a hearing scheduled at a local Aligarh court on Tuesday.
On Tuesday, the prison officials went into a tizzy after Monu Kumar was found missing from the premises during the customary counting of inmates in the evening. Subsequent scanning of the CCTV footage showed the missing inmate standing near a manhole and slithering into it stealthily soon after. The manhole is connected to a drain that runs under the prison walls and carries sledge outside the premises. The manhole cover had been left unlocked as it was scheduled for a cleaning on Wednesday.
Later, a rescue team was pressed into service which retrieved the lifeless body of the inmate out of the manhole. Soon, doctors were called in and they pronounced Monu dead, probably suffocated to death due to poisonous gas inside the drain.
Jail Superintendent Vipin Mishra said that Monu’s family had been informed about the incident, a case was registered in this connection and his body was sent for autopsy.