HARIPUR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has suspended eight officials of the central prison, Haripur, on charges of wholesale remission given to more than 10 prisoners on fake educational documents and ordered an inquiry into the affair.

The suspended officials included jail superintendent Khalid Abbas, two deputy superintendents Mohammad Ayub Khan and Zaman Khan Babar, four assistant superintendents, Noorul Basar, Abdur Razaq, Badshah Faiz and Jawad Gill, and a warder Obaid Ahmed.

The government has appointed Farrukh Sair, a PBS-20 officer, also waiting for posting, as inquiry officer to probe the matter.

As per reports, the accused jail officials facilitated prisoners, seeking remission on fake educational documents. In garb of this technical fraud, a large number of prisoners had got remission in terms of their imprisonment. The prison department has also directed the jail officials to furnish prison record of last four years to establish how many prisoners benefited from this fraud from Jan 2013 to Dec 2016.

Published in Dawn, March 4th, 2017