Green signal to filling of 69 posts in Prisons Department

Tribune News Service

Shimla, April 21

The state government today agreed to provide a grant of Rs three lakhs for promotion of sports to prisons department and Rs two lakhs for welfare of prison staff annually, besides a sum of Rs 30,000 for reward to prison staff for outstanding performance or achievements.

The decision was taken by Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh during the meeting with the officers of Directorate General of Prisons after a detailed presentation on Prisons Department by Director General Prisons Somesh Goyal who also briefed about the activities of department and the grievances here today.

Permission to fill as many as 69 posts of different categories was also given and the Chief Minster said new machinery would be provided for increasing the production and quality of the woven products by prison inmates.

The DGP disclosed that the land for construction of prison in Mandi had been transferred in the name of the department and land had also been identified for construction of a prison complex in Kullu.

The Chief Minister also directed that the possibilities of constructing similar prison cells in Rampur should be explored as the prisoners in Rampur were being kept in judicial lockup as of now. The Chief Minister said that the motto should be to provide safe, secure, caring and humane environment to the inmates whether convicts or those undertrial.

A proposal was also placed for opening a prison at Nalagarh and providing training and skills to the inmates to make them adaptable as per the needs of the industries so that they could later be absorbed by such industries.

The DGP said that at present there was 26 per cent overcrowding in prisons as the available capacity of the inmates was 1,692, including 138 female prisoners in 14 different jails. However, there were 2,137 inmates in all, including 77 female inmates housed in these jails.

He said that two proposals for new sub-jails at Rampur and Nalagarh had been sent to the government.

Apart from this, various welfare activities such as carpentry, preparing bakery products, mobile canteens, dairy farming, tailoring, dry cleaning, car washing, weaving and bag making were also being carried out in the jails. It was also disclosed that at least 32 prisoners were pursuing graduation and 75 were pursuing plus two.