IT is no secret that the country’s criminal justice system is overburdened, leading to a situation which can only be seen as flouting prisoners’ rights. This long-standing issue was raised in the KP Assembly on Tuesday, when parliamentarians were informed that most of the jails in the province housed more than the sanctioned number of inmates. According to the details, the central jails of Peshawar, Dera Ismail Khan, Bannu and Mardan, and the district jails in Timergara, Lakki Marwat and Swat have far more prisoners than the authorised capacity. The largest prison in the province, Peshawar Jail, has 3,139 prisoners against a capacity of 2,820. Similar conditions exist in other places. The Dera Ismail Khan prison has 96 more inmates than it was meant to house; Bannu has 309 excess prisoners, Mardan 103, Kohat 495, Timergara 129, Lakki Marwat 187 and Swat 289.

These conditions are not unique to KP. Overcrowded jails are a sorry sight across the country. A report presented to the Supreme Court by the federal ombudsperson’s office in November 2019 underscored the serious nature of the problem. The findings stated that 77,275 prisoners were held in about 114 jails across the country, against a collective capacity of 57,742. Consider what a mockery this makes of the concept of jails being correctional centres when the fact is that prisoners are kept like animals. An alarmingly high number of people languishing in jails across the country are undertrials whose cases remain pending in court. In fact, such prisoners account for 71pc of the prison population in KP, followed by 70pc in Sindh, 59pc in Balochistan and 55pc in Punjab. In July 2018, the Supreme Court had asked the provincial governments to come up with solutions to the problem but nothing appears to have been done in this regard. The authorities should look into this matter and take concrete steps for the speedy disposal of cases, especially where inmates have been accused of petty crimes. This is a crucial first step towards prison reform.

Published in Dawn, September 2nd, 2021