CRPF refuses DG Prison’s request to assist in frisking

BARAMULA JAIL

SUMIT SHARMA

JAMMU: There is no respite in the form of external assistance to the Prisons department that is reeling under the seizure of mobile phones and SIM cards from the inmates at the Baramulla jail with the CRPF turning down its request to be the third layer in the jail's frisking grid.
The request in this connection was made by the Directorate of Prisons specifically after recovery of the mobiles and SIM cards from inmates of the Baramulla Jail in North Kashmir.
The J&K police staff and the prisons department staff presently constitute the two layers of the frisking grid in the jails across Jammu and Kashmir.
Talking to The News Now, DG Prisons S.K. Mishra said, "Though CRPF men are providing external security to the fourteen jails in Jammu and Kashmir but they have refused to be the third layer of jail's security grid in this regard".
Authoritative sources said that the jails have three lawyers of security grid including JKP, Jail Police and the paramilitary forces.
Presently 16 battalions of CRPF have been deployed at the 14 jails in the state.
Now, the prisons department will have to find some other way to ensure that mobile phones, SIM cards and other prohibited material does not reach the inmates anyhow. The prisons department is already facing a severe staff crunch. The Baramulla Jail itself is presently being manned by 50 employees against the sanctioned strength of 120.
Pertinently, on April 2, the Kashmir police had recovered 14 phones, SIM cards and other material from inmates in Baramulla jail. Out of these, two phones were recovered from hard-line Hurriyat leader Masarat Alam Bhat, who is currently lodged in the district jail and has been under detention since 2010.
The phones were mostly found on inmates involved in militancy and stone-pelting cases. The police had said that the phones were being used by inmates to foment trouble across the Valley.