Keeping around three times more inmates than the capacity in various jails of Uttarakhand and acute staff shortage are supposed to have resulted in two major incidents involving Roorkee jail and Suddhowala jail.
To overcome the staff crunch in the jails, the jail administration is mulling to put around 100 policemen on deputation for a year from the police department. The jail administration has sent a proposal to the State Government, urging for its nod to the scheme, it learnt. IG Jail PVK Prasad said he had inspected Roorkee sub-jail, Haridwar jail and Suddhowala jail, Dehradun recently and observed there has been a shortage of space in the jails thanks to the overflow of the inmates. Around three times more inmates than the capacity are being kept in the jails. The jail officers of other districts have said the same. Things are more or less the same everywhere.
To overcome the space crunch and to accommodate the increasing number of inmates, a single cell would be divided in separate compartments, he added. Prasad further said that there has been acute staff crunch in the jails. To get over it, we are sending a proposal to the State Government, seeking around 100 policemen on deputation for a year from the police department.
He further said that taking lesson from the previous incidents, the jail officers have been directed to frisk jail officials before they enter the jail campus. Apart from this, the jail officials have been directed to ensure that a certain distance be maintained between hard- core criminals and visitors when the latter are allowed to meet the inmates in the jail campus. Police should also be extra vigilant during such meetings.
Entry of mobile phones in the jail campus has been strictly banned. Prasad further said that the officers were directed to prepare a list of items which should be kept inside the jails. The jail officials, found indulging in or conniving with illegal activities in the jail campus, will be dealt with stringently, he warned.Sources said that some objects, including knife, had been found by police in various cells where the inmates are staying. Earlier, police had recovered mobile phones, battery, charger and others from inside the prison cells