Pakistan

Overcrowded prisons : No separate jail for militants, Senate panel informed

Militants routinely threaten jail officials.

Express May 17, 2011 1 min read

ISLAMABAD:

There are over 53,000 inmates in prisons in Punjab, overcrowding barracks designated for 21,527 inmates, by more than two-and-a-half times, an official of the Punjab police informed the Senate Special Committee on Human Rights.

“There seems to be no effort on behalf of the government to release detainees who completed their sentence years ago,” observed Senator Azam Khan Swati. There are 8,450 prisoners in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), against a capacity of about 8,000 prisoners, according to Inspector General Prisons (IGP) Qudratullah.

The committee was informed that due to loopholes in the law, terrorists are not given speedy trials and the majority is able to get bail. A Senate sub-committee which visited prisons in K-P has recommended sweeping police reforms.

Senator Afrasiab Khattak, who presided over the committee, directed the interior ministry to immediately take up the issue of overcrowded prisons.

Khattak also directed the ministry to ensure the installation of jammers in all prisons across the country with the cooperation of the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority after the committee was informed that most militants make threatening calls to jail officials and other high-ups of the country and warn them with dire consequences.

IGPs of Punjab, K-P and Balochistan, informed the committee that Pakistan Telecommunication Authority had not permitted it. Sindh IG Prison told the committee that they had removed the jammer installed in Central Jail Karachi due to tremendous pressure from the Pakistan Telecommunication Auhority.

Additional Secretary Interior Nasir Hayat has, however, assured the committee that jammers will be installed in the prisons once the issue is resolved.

IGP Qudratullah informed the committee that militants were confined in general barracks with other prisoners because there was no separate facility designated for them.

Officials also informed the panel that three prisons in Mansehra, Batagram and Kohistan have yet to be reconstructed after they were washed away by last year’s floods.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 17^th, 2011.