PESHAWAR, April 13: The Peshawar Central Prison population has been about 2,500 as against the allowed capacity of 1,300.

The government had said that the problem of overcrowding the prison would be solved with the construction of a central prison at Jallozai, Nowshera district.

The construction of the promised prison at Jallozai had not begun, as the provincial government is yet to award the contract for the 2nd phase of the project.

A watchman at the site informed that the work was stopped a couple of weeks back.

The provincial government had hastily started demolishing the 150-year-old central prison in June last year. Except the main building, all the remaining compounds including the women’s section were demolished.

Previously, the women’s section was separate and was housed in a compound outside the main building. After its demolition the section was shifted to a barrack in the main building and a boundary wall was constructed around it to keep it separate from male prisoners.

The demolished section could accommodate up to 300 women prisoners. Now, sources in the prison claimed, that 86 women were huddled in the barrack which was meant for much lesser number of prisoners. Due to scarcity of space, the convicted women prisoners could not be kept here and they are shifted to other prisons in the province.

The prison officials claimed that they had been facing problems accommodating more prisoners than the capacity of the prison. They questioned that when the new prison was not available then why were various sections of the Peshawar prison being demolished.

The Inspector-General of Prisons, Colonel Abdul Rauf, when contacted informed that a sum of Rs22 million was allocated for the 2nd phase of the new prison in the current financial year. He added that in the first phase a contract was awarded by the government for the construction of a boundary wall, supply of water, and electricity to the site. The first phase, he said, was complete.

Mr Rauf said that he was not sure when work on the second phase would start as it was up to the government to award the contract to a firm.

Apart from the main prison, the project also included the construction of a borstal institution as there was no such institution in the province. Under the Juvenile Justice System Ordinance a juvenile offender could only be kept in a borstal institution.

The chairman of the Voice of Prisoners, Noor Alam Khan, said that they did not understand why the government had started demolishing the prison when the new one was not constructed.

He added that there was no urgency for the demolition of the prison.

Moreover, he added it was illogical to build a prison in Nowshera district instead of the provincial capital, which would place the under-trial prisoners as well as their counsel in a disadvantaged position. He questioned why the entire contract was not awarded to a single firm?