Officials blame old tech jammers for phone connectivity inside Parappana Agrahara jail

BENGALURU: Amid repeated raids and seizure of mobile phones at the Parappana Agrahara central jail, officials say the reason mobile network is available in Parappana Agrahara Jail is the old jammer system.

The root cause of mobile smuggling in the jail is the outdated jammer system itself. Even though 5G has been rolled out, what’s still around the jail is a 2G jammer system that was put in place 15 years ago. Due to this, there is no compatibility between the jail’s jammer and the TCBS (Telecom Customer Billing System).

The Prisons Department has brought this to the attention of the Telecom Department for the past 7-8 months. Taking advantage of this, some inmates are illegally getting Wi-Fi and talking via data calls. There is also suspicion that data calls were made on the mobile phones seized in the jail the other day.

Officials have seized 300 phones from Parappana Agrahara Jail in the last eight months. Among them, most of the SIMs are SIM cards with Andhra Pradesh addresses. Prison Department officials have warned the Andhra Airtel network company several times. They are now considering filing a case against the network staff who provided the SIMs as well.