Corruption-hit Jail Dept lures cops with promotion

Jupinderjit Singh

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 21

With more and more jail cadre staff coming under the scanner for alleged corruption or dereliction of duty, the Department of Jails has offered promotion to Punjab Police officials if they want to serve in the jail cadre.

Availing the incentive, four inspectors from the Police Department have joined as DSP, Security, Jails.

One of them told The Tribune that he grabbed the opportunity as he did not want to wait for a decade to get a promotion.

Besides corruption issues, the Jail Department has also been facing shortage of eligible candidates, especially for the posts of Superintendent of Jails and other gazetted ranks.

Newly appointed Minister for Jails Sukhjinder Randhawa had stated earlier this month that jails had only 50 per cent of the staff. This was because 13 DSPs declined to join the department in 2016, citing “poor working conditions”.

A year earlier, only nine of the 24 Assistant Superintendents joined duty. Later, five of them resigned. While 14 jail officials, including a DIG-rank cop, were indicted for dereliction of duty leading to access of mobile phones to Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) militants in a jail, two others were suspended on recovery of mobile phones from Gurdaspur jails.

An inquiry is on in Ludhiana over the escape of two undertrials from the jail and several others are in the dock over recovery of drugs and mobile phones in their respective jails. It had earlier also tried to involve the Punjab Police for the managerial work as the department is mostly headed by an ADGP-rank officer from the police cadre. However, the police officials have not been enthusiastic about the jail duty. Only two officials had opted for it in the past three years.

ADGP, Prisons, Inder Preet Singh Sahota said, “The Department of Jails needs more officials and it would be better if experienced staff from other uniformed force join on deputation. The four new DSPs have performed well so far. Randhawa had honoured one of them for recovery of mobiles and drugs from Amritsar jails.”

Sahota hoped that more officials from the Police Department would show interest in working with the Department of Jails.