KARACHI: Jailbreaks occur all over the world, including the United States and Russia, and escape of prisoners from the Karachi prison was not a unique incident, said Sindh Prisons Minister Ziaul Hassan Lanjar.

He was responding to legislators’ queries during the Question Hour that pertained to law and prisons department in the Sindh Assembly’s Wednesday session.

When Pakistan Muslim League-F’s lawmaker Nusrat Abbasi asked what security measures the government had taken at the Karachi jail as prisoners escaped from it, the minister said prisoners escaped even from jails in other countries.

‘Mobile phone jammers, closure of roads near jail make lives difficult’

Former prisons minister Manzoor Wassan said the Sukkur jail had also witnessed a similar jailbreak during Ghaus Ali Shah’s government in 1980s [when Ms Abbasi’s party was in power] and hundreds of prisoners escaped.

Responding to a question by Pakistan Peoples Party’s Heer Soho about the number of terrorists and members of banned outfits in Sindh prisons, the minister said they were 275 in number.

MQM lawmaker Qamar Rizvi said that around half a million residents living close to the Karachi Central Prison suffered owing to mobile phone jammers installed in the facility and closure of roads around it at night. He asked the minister to relocate the jail, to which Mr Lanjar said the government was aware of the issues and was planning to construct a high-security prison in Thatta.

“Another one will be established in the West district which will provide relief to the residents around the central prison,” he maintained.

Prisoners’ education

When Ms Abbasi asked why the government was not making seeking education for inmates compulsory when it had made it compulsory for children, the minister appreciated the advice and said the government would look into it.

To another of her questions, the minister said there was only a primary school inside the Sukkur jail but if inmates wanted to pursue further education, the government facilitated them by providing syllabus, books and other study material up to the level of PhD. Good libraries, stocked with good reading material, were also located inside the prisons.

About the prisoners in Sukkur jail, Mr Lanjar said 26 of them since 2011 had received training in different trades like tailoring, plumbing, pottery making, electrical repairing, religious education and haircutting.

When Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf’s Khurram Sher Zaman asked about the mechanism for ascertaining public prosecutor’s performance, the minister said the government received weekly reports from judges in districts.

“Promotions of prosecutors depend on these reports,” he added.

Responding to a question by MQM’s Dilawar Qureshi that the law required that the MPA from the area where a jail was located was to be an ex-officio member of a committee that oversaw the respective jail affairs, but the legislators were not made part of these committees, the minister said that such committees had been notified by the home department but he did not say if the relevant MPAs were part of these committees.

Opposition Leader MQM’s Khawaja Izharul Hassan said he had reports that the prisoners were living in unhygienic conditions and the jail authorities were not allowing the MPAs to visit the jail saying the Rangers had objection over it and when they asked the Rangers they said they had no option.

On that, the minister said there were genuine security reasons but he could direct the home secretary to arrange for Mr Hassan’s visit to the facility along with other MPAs whenever they liked.

When Mr Sher Zaman asked why the prosecutors had been sent to the US, the minister said the visit was arranged by the USAID for their training.

Others who also participated in the discussion were MQM’s Waqar Shah, Rana Ansar, Irum Farooqui, Sumeta Syed, Sabir Qaimkhani, Zafar Kamali; PTI’s Seema Zia and PML-N’s Sorath Thebo.

Published in Dawn, May 10th, 2018