The neglected probation system

There are approximately 90,000 people incarcerated in the prisons of Pakistan including men, women, juveniles, minors with their mothers and so on. All provinces are faced with the problem of overcrowded prisons. In Punjab, for example, with a capacity to house 21,527 inmates, there were 51,133 prison inmates, including 745 juveniles, by the end of September 2015. A staggering 34,860 or 70 per cent of these inmates were under trial. The staff strength of the Prisons Department is around 17,795, with a total sanctioned budget of Rs7.5 billion for the financial year 2014-15. In addition, there were 23,395 probationers in the province, including 22,974 male, 300 female and 105 juvenile, as well as 575 male and one female parolee. The Probation and Reclamation Department in Punjab has 95 officers, including one director, five deputy directors, 14 assistant directors, 55 male probation officers, two female probation officers, 15 male parole officers and five female parole officers. The sanctioned budget for the department was Rs116.078 million for financial year 2015-16. This shows that with only 1.54 per cent budget as compared to the Prisons Department, the Probation Department is taking care of 45.75 per cent of the prison population of the province.

Similarly, in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) around 10,000 prison inmates occupy the space for 8,285 prisoners with almost 70 per cent under trial, including 274 women and 395 juveniles. The staff strength of the Prisons Department in K-P is 4,049, with an annual budget of Rs1,268 million for 2014. The total non-salary expenditure during the year was Rs599.62 million. There are approximately 2,000 probationers and 25 parolees at the K-P Probation and Reclamation Department, which had an annual budget of only Rs31.67 million for 2013-14. Balochistan and Sindh are no different either. In Sindh, the prison population in December 2015 was 19,372 with 3,276 convicted, including 40 females and 10 juveniles. Around 465 were under the death sentence, including two females, while under-trials numbered 15,351, including 150 females and 211 juveniles. With 25 male and one female probation officer, Sindh has 645 probationers.

The purpose of this piece and the above data is to highlight how neglected but important the probation system in Pakistan is. The criminal justice system in the country is focused on punishment. It does not take into account how investments in and strengthening of the probation system can help reduce the prison population. In their current state, prisons are considered nurseries for producing criminals. While huge investments are made every year for improving prison infrastructure, most inmates still live in miserable conditions.

Probation is a court-imposed sanction that “releases a convicted offender into the community under a conditional suspended sentence”. This practice assumes that most offenders are not dangerous and will respond well to treatment. The average probationer is often a first-time, non-violent offender, who can be best served by remaining in the community while serving out the sentence. The probation system places an offender under the supervision of a probation officer in lieu of imprisonment as long as the probationer meets certain standards of conduct.

Why are alternatives to detention important, particularly for children? According to Unicef, alternatives to detention are measures that may be imposed on children who are being formally processed through the criminal justice system, at both pre-trial and sentencing stages that do not involve the deprivation of liberty. These alternatives are inexpensive, while detentions can be expensive and lead to overcrowding of prisons, besides leaving juveniles and other inmates vulnerable to abuse and exploitation.

According to the Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Child, one of the easiest ways to resolve the problem of overcrowded prisons in Pakistan is by invoking the system of probation and parole. Probation is particularly useful in cases of offenders who are not yet committed to a life of crime. The relevant laws have existed for decades in Pakistan, where over 70 per cent of the prison population consists of offenders whose sentence terms range from one month to a year. Generally, most have landed behind bars as a result of petty disputes, such as fights over land or water, or due to family feuds. Most are devoid of any criminal characteristics. Their interaction with confirmed criminals and professionals in jail only harms them rather than doing them any good.

After the introduction of the National Judicial Policy (NJP) 2009 by the National Judicial Policy Making Committee (NJPMC) headed by the then chief justice of Pakistan, significant progress was noticed in the use of probation as an alternative measure to detention in the country. There were 10,362 probationers in Pakistan in 2005, while today there are approximately 26,000, mostly in Punjab and K-P. This was made possible as the NJPMC advised the courts and government to maximally use the Probation of Offenders Ordinance 1960 and the Good Conduct Prisoners Probation Release Act 1926, by releasing deserving convicts on probation and parole as prescribed by the law. The Committee also recommended that alleged child offenders’ cases be given higher preference. I am not sure if there is that level of focus anymore on the implementation of the NJP, with reference to the utilisation of the probation system and strongly recommend a continued focus on it. There must also be continuous follow-ups with the government and the district level Criminal Justice Coordination Committees for progress in each district of Pakistan, particularly in K-P, the Islamabad Capital Territory and Punjab, where the Police Order 2002 is still in place. In Balochistan and Sindh, district and sessions judges can be followed up with.

Provincial governments must encourage their respective Probation and Reclamation Departments and focus on creating awareness among stakeholders regarding the probation system and also about the NJP as an effective alternative to the detention and incarceration of offenders, including child and women offenders. Efforts should also be made to bridge the gap between the judiciary, police and the probation department. The provincial and federal judicial academies should play an active role in creating widespread understanding about the utilisation of the probation system, and last but not the least, the provincial governments should make a comparative analysis of the budgetary allocation for Probation and Prisons departments and their outcomes, and increase budgetary allocations for these.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 10th, 2016.