ICT Police to set up temporary jail in Islamabad

ISLAMABAD: The Federal Capital Police administration has decided to establish a temporary jail in the jurisdiction of Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) to keep the under trial prisoners till the completion of the District Jail, Islamabad, being built since 2009 in Sector H-16, the police authorities disclosed.

The Islamabad Police are using the Rawalpindi District Jail for keeping their inmates since the establishment of ICT as a separate independent set-up for the Federal Capital Islamabad in 1980.

“The Islamabad Police and administrations are facing multiple difficulties created by the Punjab government,” the sources said. “Besides to control extra financial burdens, transportation of under trial inmates from jail to courts and back to Adiala jail and security are among the prime issues and reasons to set up a separate temporary jail for under trial people in Islamabad courts,” the ICT Police sources said.

Evidently, the recent political situation also seems to have created an emergency to establish a temporary jail inside the Federal Capital Territory. About a month ago, one building in I-series sectors of Islamabad was also declared ‘Islamabad Jail’ by the federal government.

In the past, the government approved a modern jail in Zone-IV of Islamabad but later that plan apparently has been shifted to Sector H-16. The reasons put forth by the ICT Police sources for establishing a ‘temporary jail’ on an urgent basis may sound good enough but the fact remains that the situation is nothing new and inmates are being kept in Adiala Jail, located in Rawalpindi, since it was established.

The Adiala Jail was established after the old jail, located inside Rawalpindi Cantonment area, where the former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was kept and eventually hanged, was demolished and turned into a public park.

Since then, under trial inmates were being transported to Islamabad courts and back every morning and evening.