Manu Sharma

New Delhi, Nov. 10: Caught partying on camera while on parole, Manu Sharma today made a voluntary return to jail — nearly a fortnight early.

Surprised Tihar officials said the 32-year-old, jailed for life for the 1999 murder of model Jessica Lal, walked into jail No. 2 around 11.30 this morning.

“He came back at 11.30am. We had no prior information about his arrival. He has been sent to his cell,” Tihar law officer Sunil Gupta said.

Sources said Manu’s parole party was disrupted after he got into a scrap with Delhi police commissioner Y.S. Dadwal’s son Pranay at F-Bar, a pub at Ashok Hotel, on Friday night.

After Pranay called his father, about 50 policemen raided the place. By then Manu had hopped to LAP, a nearby pub.

But Manu, out on parole till November 22 on the ground that his mother Shakti Rani was seriously ill in Chandigarh, had been caught on camera stepping into LAP.

If Manu’s surrender saved Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit further blushes, sources said his return to Tihar was not as “voluntary” as it appeared.

As reports of his pub-hopping became public, the Delhi government, which had recommended his parole, asked both Delhi and Chandigarh police to establish Manu’s whereabouts since his temporary release.

Later in the day, in their report to the home department, Delhi police confirmed that the man in the pub footage was indeed Manu.

“The news that Manu was in the pub footage must have reached them (the Sharmas) and they decided there was no way he could stay out. No political connections could save him after that. The fact that he wasn’t in Chandigarh is basis enough to cancel parole,” a police official said.

Manu, son of senior Haryana Congress leader Venod Sharma, was alone when he presented himself at the prison gates. He filed an application for surrender and walked straight to his cell.

Lawyer Majid Memon said Manu’s voluntary walk to confinement could help him when he applies for bail in the Supreme Court. “He can show he chose to waive his parole which is a good thing,” Menon said.

But Delhi police, who today said they hadn’t been consulted about granting parole to Manu, plan to use the CCTV footage against him if he applies for bail to prove that he had violated parole conditions.