Umesh Reddy | Photo credit: file photo
After the episode of Kannada actor Darshan allegedly getting privileges in jail caused embarrassment to the Karnataka police, now another video has surfaced.
This time, it shows inmates, including a serial rapist, freely using cell phones and watching television inside their cells at the Central Prison.
After the videos went viral, the Additional Director General of Prisons and Correctional Services on Saturday ordered officials to verify the footage. The Deputy Inspector General of Prisons will conduct a preliminary investigation into the videos, which were believed to have been filmed between 2023 and 2025.
Police said a case will be registered at the Parappana Agrahara police station to find out who smuggled the mobile phones into the jail, who supplied them to the inmates, the timing of the videos and how they got to the media.
Among those seen in the video is Umesh Reddy, once known as India’s most notorious serial rapist, who is said to have access to mobile phones and television.
Reddy, who terrorized women between 1996 and 2002, was accused of raping and murdering several women and faced 30 years to life in prison. He later claimed he was mentally unstable in an attempt to escape the gallows. However, a medical examination conducted at NIMHANS confirmed otherwise.
Based on a request for clemency, the Supreme Court commuted his death sentence to 30 years in prison without parole in 2022. Reddy is now lodged in Bengaluru’s Parappana Agrahara Central Jail and is said to be nearing the end of his jail term.
Despite being kept with other convicts in a regular cell block, recent videos showing Reddy using two Android smartphones and a keypad phone in jail have gone viral.
Another video allegedly shows Tarun Raju, an accused in a gold smuggling case, using a mobile phone and even cooking food in jail. Another video shows Juhad Hameed Shakeel, a wanted ISIS operative housed in the prison, reportedly enjoying a facility inside the prison with access to a smartphone.
The allegations sparked outrage and raised serious concerns about flaws in the state’s central prison system. Local residents have complained that powerful jammers installed around the prison have disrupted their mobile signal, although inmates appear to be using phones without restriction.
Published – 8 Nov 2025 21:09 IST
