150 Detainees Shifted Out From Jammu Kashmir Jails, Reports

SRINAGAR: As many as 150 detinees have been shifted to outside jails from Jammu and Kashmir, a Jammu newspaper reported exclusively. The detainees are militants from Kashmir and Pakistan.

They have been shifted to Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and New Delhi. The newspaper reported that this was aimed at “effectively” checking the “deradicalization of prisoners in Jammu and Kashmir jails, especially by the Pakistani militants”.

“Majority of the militants shifted from Jammu and Kashmir were lodged in high-security Kot Bhalwal jail under Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA),” the Daily Excelsior quoted sources saying. It added that the “shifting of Pakistani militants outside will help overcome radicalization of other detenues as well as carrying out militant activities from inside the prison through mobile telephones etc”.

The newspaper said that the jail authorities in Uttar Pradesh, New Delhi and Haryana have been asked to completely segregate the Pakistani and Kashmiri militants besides the PSA detenues to ensure that they are not able to meet each other.

The sources told the newspaper further: “Mainly those separatists and militants are being shifted to outside jails who the administration feels could radicalize ordinary criminals in the prisons or those who could instigate subversive activities from inside the jails using mobile telephones and social media.”

The move, the sources said, will break the “network of the militants being run from the prisons” and “act as deterrence for future.”