Relatives complain about ill-treatment of prisoners at Mardan jail

MARDAN: The relatives of the prisoners and leaders of different political parties on Wednesday criticized the ill-treatment of prisoners at Mardan Jail.

Speaking at a news conference, former federal minister Nawabzada Khwaja Muhammad Khan Hoti, Maulana Shuja-ul-Mulk, Pukhtoon Student Federation (PSF) leader Sabir Mayar, Owais Khan, Mufti Abdul Wakil, Irshad Ahmed and relatives of the prisoners said that the jail superintendent was transferring prisoners from Mardan to other jails in the province and abusing their families and relatives.

They said that a committee comprising all parties should be formed and, with permission from the administration, they should be allowed to visit the prison so that they can review the arrangements and facilities for the prisoners.

They argued that the jail did not have proper arrangements for langar, while food items were being sold at double the official price-list in the shop inside the jail.

They alleged that the jail superintendent sold the government air-coolers to the prisoners. They said that medicines that were supplied to the prisoners were being sold outside and only two types of medicines were being given to the prisoners. They added that prisoners who raised their voice

against the brutality and abuse of the prison administration, were transferred to prisons far away from Mardan, where it became difficult for their relatives and loved ones to meet them.

They added that no hospital administration in Mardan Jail was ready to conduct post-mortems of the dead prisoners. They demanded that the provincial government should take action against the mistreatment and abuse of prisoners in the prison of Mardan.