FAISALABAD, Oct 13: The prisons department is trying to search ways to provide gifts to female and juvenile prisoners on the eve of Eid.

Sources said on Friday the department had no means to carry out the job with available resources.

The sources said that Chief Minister’s Task Force on Women and Juvenile Prisoners chairman Syeda Majida Zaidi had asked the IG prisons to arrange distribution of Eid gifts among women and juvenile prisoners one week before the Eid so that they could celebrate the occasion as desired by the chief minister.

They, however, said the prisons department was not in a position to accomplish the task as it had no funds under any head out of which Eid gifts could be distributed among the prisoners.

To accomplish the task, the sources said the department had sought the assistance of DCOs and sent letters to them.

The letter read: “There is no budget in any head of account available with the prisons department out of which gifts could be distributed among women and juvenile prisoners as desired by the chief minister. It has, therefore, been decided that funds available with the account of the Prisons Aid Society under your purview may be utilised for the purpose.”

The department had also asked the DCOs to take immediate steps to release funds.

The gifts would include clothes, shoes, henna, bangles and sweets.

The jail superintendents, the sources said, had also been asked to contact with the DCOs for funds.

District jail superintendent Mohammad Yousaf Ghauri said: “Every year we interact with local industrialists and philanthropists for Eid gifts and this year too efforts will be made to ensure their distribution”.