PESHAWAR: Director investigation Wafaqi Mohtasib and secretary National Committee on Prison Reforms Zaryab Musarrat on Wednesday visited the Peshawar central prison to collect information regarding difficulties being faced by the juvenile prisoners.

She was accompanied by provincial committee on prison reforms president Sajid Mumtaz Jadoon. They visited the juvenile barrack and discussed the construction of the proposed new barrack for juvenile prisoners with the jail superintendent Masudur Rehman.

The new barrack will also have a library and study room and cost Rs2.4 million, which will be provided by private volunteers, said an official statement. There are about 200 juvenile prisoners in a barrack having the capacity of only 60 inmates.

The committee of Wafaqi Mohtasib was constituted in pursuance of the Supreme Court directives in a suo motu case. Asma Jehangir advocate is chairperson of the committee.

On this occasion, Zaryab Musarrat said that the purpose of the visit was to know about the difficulties of nearly 200 juvenile prisoners in the jail and their schooling to rehabilitate them in society after their release. She said that there are 45 juveniles with 130 women prisoners, adding that they had planned shifting of the overage children to the Sweet Home.

Mr Jadoon said that a sub-committee of the prison reforms committee had been formed at the provincial level to look into matters pertaining to education of the juvenile prisoners. He said that the central jail, Haripur, had been linked with Comsat University and central jail, Peshawar, with the University of Peshawar, Islamia College University and Allama Iqbal Open University.

Published in Dawn, September 8th, 2016