Capt calls meeting to review jail security

CHANDIGARH Taking a serious view of the violence in Gurdaspur Central Jail, chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh has convened a high-level meeting of police and home department officials next week to review the security in the state’s prisons in the light of frequent incidents of violence and clashes in jails.

At the meeting next week, the government will review the report submitted recently by the high-powered committee on jail reforms and initiate measures to improve the prison administration in Punjab.

In a statement issued here, Raveen Thukral, media adviser to the CM, said that Captain Amarinder had ordered the officers concerned to deal with the situation in Gurdaspur jail as they deemed fit and ensure that law and order was restored in the prison without delay.

Expressing concern over the frequent troubles in Punjab’s prisons, the chief minister said he had been in touch with senior police, prison and intelligence officials since the violence erupted in the Gurdaspur prison and the situation was now under control.

Thukral said the chief minister lauded the restraint showed by the staff on duty, who did not cause any injury to any of the inmates even though they were forced to fire in the air to contain the miscreants.

He disclosed that cases under relevant sections had been registered against the miscreants for assaulting jail staff, rioting, destruction of government property and violation of jail rules.

GANGSTERS INCITED VIOLENCE

In his preliminary report on the Gurdaspur incident, state home secretary NS Kalsi said the incident took place when a few gangsters, undergoing trial in murder cases, incited jail inmates lodged in one of the barracks to confront the prison staff after assaulting three jail warders on duty.