209 under detention
Nasir Azam
Srinagar, Apr 09 : As many 4350 persons were languishing in jails of Jammu & Kashmir Union Territory by the end of February this year, official data reveals.
The data accessed by the Srinagar-based news gathering agency lays bare that 4212 males and 138 females were languishing in 13 jails of J&K. J&K UT had 14 jails for lodging undertrials, convicts and detenues but Hira Nagar jail was de-notified as a prison on March 05 and then notified as holding center for lodging of Rohingaya refugees by the UT’s Home department.
Of them, only 170 are convicts- 166 males and four are females, the prison statistics reveal.
According to the data, 3971 persons lodged in jails are undergoing trial in different courts. Among the undertrials, 3837 are males and 134 are females.
As many as 209 persons were lodged under the Public Safety Act in different jails of the UT. The PSA law enacted in 1978 allows detention without a trial for period ranging from three months to two years,
According to the age-profile of PSA detenues, 71 are in age group of 18-25, 66 in 25-35, 40 in 35-45 and 24 in 45-60 and eight are 60 years onwards.
The data reveals that Kotbhalwal jail in Jammu houses the highest number of inmates as 865 persons were lodged there as on February 28, 2021. It is followed by Jammu jail (650) and Srinagar jail (610)—(KNO)
