Two jails being constructed to resolve issue of overcrowded prisons

Against their total capacity of housing 13,038 inmates, the prison facilities in Sindh currently have 16,793 prisoners.

This was pointed out by Federal Ombudsman Syed Tahir Shahbaz on Thursday during a meeting with Sindh Chief Secretary Mumtaz Ali Shah on jail reforms in the province. Adviser to Ombudsman Aijaz Qureshi, Federal Secretary to Ombudsman Abdul Malik Ghori, Sindh Advocate General Salman Talibuddin, Sindh Home Secretary Captain (retd) Abdul Kabir Qazi, IG Prisons Nusrat Mangan and others also attended the meeting.

The federal ombudsman said there were various issues in the prisons of Sindh as the number of inmates incarcerated here was more than their capacity. The chief secretary informed the meeting that two new jails were being constructed in the province in order to deal with the high number of prisoners in Sindh. A maximum-security prison was being constructed near Thatta, he said.

Shah asserted that the district oversight committees were functioning in the province to implement the prisons reforms and monitor the jails in Sindh. The committees, he said, comprised senior retired officers of judiciary, civil service and police, and philanthropists and civil society representatives who regularly visited the jails to monitor their management and resolve their day-to-day issues.