Jail admin finds jirga more effective than law

Source Dawn

The administration of Kohat jail has resorted to traditional way of convening a jirga to defuse sectarian tension among prisoners instead of taking legal action against the inmates, who clashed with each other two day ago, according to well-placed sources.

Seventeen prisoners were injured when Shia and Sunni inmates of the jail clashed on Sunday over chalking of controversial slogans on the walls of jail barracks.
“After ending the fighting, SSP Atiqullah Wazir, DSP Ihsanullah Khan, jail superintendent Aitezaz Jadoon, other senior officials and representatives of Shia and Sunni prisoners held a jirga to find out solution to the ongoing sectarian tension in the prison,” sources said.
The prisoners assured the administration that they would not indulge in wall chalking, which hurt the feelings of the rival sect, and live together peacefully in future.
The administration also cleared the wall chalking, which caused clash between the two groups of prisoners, and decided to search the inmates every month to confiscate illegal items from them.
The jail staff also recovered sharp edge tools and knives, made from cutting ghee tins, from both the groups of prisoners.
The district administration deployed 20 more policemen to monitor activities of the prisoners. It had already detailed 20 policemen for security of the jail earlier due to shortage of prisoner staff.
Meanwhile, the injured prisoners were discharged from hospitals and sent back to their lockups on Monday.
It is worth mentioning that local journalists received phone calls from prisoners, belonging to both groups, after the clashes. The prisoners spread rumours about killing of their colleagues. They also said that jail administration started clean-up operation in the prison. However, prison authorities denied the reports.Sources said that prisoners were not only possessing cellular phones but hashish was also sold in the jail openly. The prisoners used to talk to their families and friends by cellular phones and also ran drug business, a jail official confided.

Additional force called after protest in Kohat jail

POSTED IN DAWN



KOHAT, July 6: The Kohat prison authorities called in additional force to control the situation when ‘Taliban’ inmates resorted to protest against the arrest of their colleague from the jail mosque on Monday.

The inmates, who had been arrested by police suspecting them to be Taliban, staged protest for more than two hours and broke taps and pipes.

Official sources said the suspected Taliban, arrested during operations in tribal and settled areas and imprisoned in the Kohat district prison, slapped and kicked a drug seller, injuring him. The victim complained to the staff after which police took action and arrested a Taliban inmate inside the mosque.

This infuriated the Taliban who gathered in large numbers holding sticks and accusing police of desecrating the mosque by arresting a man inside the mosque. The protesters demanded that the jail authorities should stop “selling of hashish, sleeping pills and use of mobile phones by some influential prisoners in connivance with wardens”.

District Police Officer Dilawar Khan Bangash and Assistant Coordination Officer Shabbir Mohammad reached the prison along with a huge contingent of police to control the situation.

The matter was settled between the Taliban and the jail administration following detailed search of the belongings and barracks of the prisoners allegedly involved in the illegal business. Nothing was recovered from them.

Later, the administration decided to send four ‘notorious’ Taliban who had created all the mess to the Deral Ismail Khan central jail.

An inquiry has been ordered into the incident to review the behaviour of the jail staff with prisoners.