KARACHI, April 14: The Public Accounts Committee of the Sindh Assembly has blamed mismanagement in prisons for sporadic eruption of violence there, and if the authorities concerned monitor it, the collusion of prison staff with inmates can be exposed and conditions in prisons improved.This was observed by PAC chief Jam Tamachi Unnar while presiding over a meeting held on Thursday to consider the draft paras of the home department for 2006-07, 2007-08 and 2008-09.

PAC members Ghulam Mujadid Isran, Shama Mithani, Aamir Pirzada, Syed Bachal Shah and Shoaib Ibrahim criticised departments' failure to produce relevant records at the time of audit, but when draft paras were made part of the audit report and the PAC set a meeting schedule, suddenly records of previous years were produced.

The PAC chief directed the home secretary to issue show-cause notices and fix responsibility for the negligence.

Acting Home Secretary Muhammad Riazuddin referring to efforts being made for the recovery of outstanding utility charges of Rs21.316 million from officials residing in government quarters, informed the PAC the measures taken by the department for the installation of separate meters for individuals.

He said a committee was working to reconcile amounts with the Sui Southern Gas Company and the Hyderabad Electric Supply Company. In this connection, he said, three meetings had been held during the current year.

Audit DG Najmul Saqib Siddiqui informed the meeting that out of Rs21.994 million only Rs0.663 million was recovered.

The home secretary also informed the PAC about the initiatives taken by the government to improve prison conditions and food supplied to prisoners and medical care with removing corrupt staff from prisons.The committee was informed that Rs115.559 million was paid as compensation to the legal heirs of persons killed at Nishtar Park and those on May 12, 2007.

Another huge amount of Rs408.237 million drawn from the PLA funds could not be ratified due to transfer of funds. The home secretary informed the PAC that details of the secret funds used could not be provided.

Other paras which were deferred pertained to expenditures of prisons in the province involving financial indiscipline.

DIG (prisons) Nusrat Mangan, representing the IG (prisons), who could not make it due to his appearance in the high court, said the practice of cooking food items in prisons had been done away with and now a contractor was responsible for providing cooked food to prisoners against payment of Rs279 per day per prisoner.

Likewise, now medicines were made available to prisoners for treatment and soap on a fortnightly basis.

He said drugs, cellphones and other contraband items were sneaked into prisons mostly by visitors who passed them to prison inmates. Sometimes prisoners after appearing in courts managed to conceal heroin capsules in their body through swallowing.

He said recently a prisoner was operated upon when two capsules burst in his body and on operation five more capsules were recovered from the body.

He asked PAC members to visit the prison and see a lot of improvement in the conditions there.

However, he agreed to the objection that some hardened criminals directed their criminal activity from prison through cellphones.

In reply to a question, the DIG said in cases where meagre amounts were involved for release of prisoners after completion of the sentence period, the money was arranged through nongovernmental organisations. However, in cases of drivers facing prison in accidental deaths, payment of compensation to the bereaved family was a basic requirement under the law.