Daily Times

Life of man and crime are two things that go parallel every second. Crime will not stop as long as there remains the existence of man on earth. In the early days of man’s life on earth, there were no local laws to have properly defined what a crime was and what wasn’t. Crimes must have been committed even before that, but it is said that the first one that was committed was: murder. The killing of a man at the hands of his brother. That story, I don’t think, needs any explanation. As life progressed, crimes gained steam.

However, to secure human life and ensure its smooth run, laws are enacted and law enforcement agencies (LEAs) are meant to implement them. Get any daily newspaper and you will be able to read about the lawbreakers being imprisoned by LEAs.

Prisons are nearly full everywhere. Criminals serve their sentences and come out. Despite all that, there is little change in the minds that remain behind bars for months and years. Sometimes, the post-sentence attitude of an individual is way uglier than his pre-prison life. It is not but the approach that is faulty. Countries have tried various ways to reform the minds of incarcerated individuals. Books help much in this regard. Mario Culigiuri, the Culture Representative of Calabria, once told the Independent, a British news agency:

“Reading is an extraordinary antidote to unhappiness and promotes awareness and social and personal redemption.”

Here is how different countries have attempted to promote book reading among incarcerated individuals over the last decade. In 2012, a program dubbed “Redemption through Reading” was introduced in Brazil. Under the system in question, an inmate would get four days in his sentence cut for reading a book. This inspired a similar move in Italy where in 2014, a bill was approved to reduce jail time to three days for each book read by an inmate. In the same vein, in 2019, when a US-backed government was in power in Kabul, a bill was drafted that extended a six-day reduction in jail term to inmates reading a 100-page book and then providing 10 minutes of information on it. Most recently, in 2022, the Bolivian government launched a program called “Books Behind Bars.”

Books To Prisoners aims to foster a love of reading behind bars, encourage the pursuit of knowledge and self-empowerment, and break the cycle of recidivism.

The state-introduced program offers detainees a chance to get out of jail days or weeks in advance of their date of release. In addition, there are also some non-governmental organizations in various countries, which provide free-of-cost books to prisoners. Books Through Bars is one such prominent example of working in this area. As mentioned plain on its website, it has been dispatching free books to incarcerated people in six mid-Atlantic states: Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia for more than thirty years. Another such example is the Books To Prisoners (B2P).

It is a Seattle-based organization, which, it says, aims to foster a love of reading behind bars, encourage the pursuit of knowledge and self-empowerment, and break the cycle of recidivism. In Pakistan, such initiatives have hardly seen the light of day. Not only are people losing interest in book reading but successive governments have also paid no heed to this important matter. Inmates’ sentences are reduced in Pakistan but not as a reward for a general book reading. These are often done on special religious days. A recent case in point is when in May 2021, the cabinet meeting presided over by then Prime Minister Imran Khan decided to reduce the sentences by 30 days of those who were involved in minor offences.

This happened before Eid. Additionally, the Prison Rules currently in vogue in Pakistan do have a separate chapter Remission System. There are a range of acts that, if a prisoner does, lead to a reduction in sentence. However, there is no mention of remission for reading a general book.

While a majority of incarcerated individuals might be illiterate, it is not the case with everyone. There are many who want to grow in terms of knowledge. In mid-January, 2022, Naeem Shah, who was convicted of murder in 2011 and is said to be serving his sentence at Central Jail Karachi, was reported to have scored 954 marks out of 1,100 in his intermediate exam. There were also reports in the media that this achievement enabled him to receive a one-million-rupee scholarship from the Institute of Chartered Accounts of Pakistan.

Provided that book reading needs to be promoted among behind-the-bar individuals with remission in a sentence. This is one of many ways to effectively break the cycle of recidivism with. Enacting a relevant law can make it possible only.

The writer is a police officer with an interest in local social issues and international affairs. He tweets @Numanbacha20