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Plan to release aged prisoners

PATNA, SEPT. 12. The Bihar Government is planning to release prisoners aged over 70 languishing in different jails of the state on humanitarian ground to ease overcrowding.

The Bihar Jail Minister, Raghwendra Pratap Singh, told PTI today that he had directed IG (prisons) Deepak Kumar Singh to prepare a list of such prisoners so that they could be released on October two, Gandhi Jayanti.

Following the directives of the jail minister, a high level meeting in this regard was held here on Friday involving Home Secretary Girish Shanker and the IG (Prisons).

Prisons in 38 districts of Bihar are overcrowded and in many jails the number of prisoners has exceeded manifold than the actual capacity. This had led to the inmates staging protests on many occasions demanding better civic amenities.

The minister said a similar move was initiated earlier by the state government, but the then Governor Vinod Chandra Pande had returned the proposal on technical ground.

Pande's stand was that the case of each prisoner should be reviewed and the superintendents of the concerned jail should give an undertaking on affidavit that the prisoners once released would not return to the world of crime.

As no jail superintendent or jailer could give such an undertaking, the proposal to release the aged prisoners and those who have overstayed their jail term could not materialise.

The minister said ``We have initiatied the move afresh as long years of jail term might have improved their behaviour and their attitude towards life.''

``Once I get the list of prisoners, I myself will go to the Governor M Rama Jois along with IG prisons and home secretary to plead the case of such prisoners,'' he said.

``I am confident that the present Governor coming from the legal field will adopt a sympathetic attitude towards such prioners,'' he added. PTI

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