Thiruvananthapuram: The two young women remand prisoners who escaped from Attakulangara Women's Sub-Jail on Tuesday have left authorities confused as to how they could scale its high walls.
Women prisoners are allowed to work on the premises, during which time the duo had possibly prepared the ground for the escape.
They are still at large, and cops have spread their net as they suspect that they have fled to Tamil Nadu.
Sandhya, 26, and Shilpa, 23, managed to escape after reportedly climbing a Moringa tree. The CCTV visuals show they were on the jail premises until 5:17.
This is said to be the first such instance of women prisoners escaping from a jail in the state. Their absence was noticed during a headcount.
The two got into an auto-rickshaw and fled. Though the police managed to track down its driver, they could not get any lead.
Police also said that since the two are remand prisoners, they were not wearing the prison uniform, which helped them to escape.
Cops feel that the two who were behind bars in connection with theft and cheating cases have left the city limits. Jail DIG Santhosh Kumar told DC that his team had taken statements of the sub-jail officials to know whether they received any help from the staff and prisoners.
"We are examining the statements of the staff and prisoners," he said.
"Usually, we don't entrust any job to remand prisoners. We have since tightened the security here."
The investigating team is planning to issue lookout notice on them on Thursday.
Two days before their escape, they had allegedly used the jail telephone to speak to a stranger, which is also being probed.
