Daily Times

LAHORE: The Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) is all set to replicate its Prison Management Information System (PMIS) in 20 jails of the Punjab in the first phase with customised features and some new modules after successful launch of the pilot project at Lahore District Jail.

PITB Chairman Dr Umar Saif said that the significance of the project needed to make quick and critical administrative and financial decisions for a security-oriented society. These decisions would be viable and prudent based on facts and figures that should be made readily available by maintaining a database and efficient processing of the information, he added.

Through the PIMS, information of 49,776 prisoners, 8,503 visitors and 136 patients hospitalised in the jail had been gathered.

The Punjab Prisons Department under the Punjab Home Department, intends to automate 43 functional jails in Punjab to update prison records to strengthen the criminal justice system. These facilities house more than 50,000 inmates. The project will be divided into two phases. In the 1st phase, 20 jails will be automated over the span of 18 months.

“For automation of 20 jails across Punjab, we will replicate the software developed for District Jail, Lahore; bringing improvements and adding new features to the existing modules. At District Jail, Lahore, there is an average of 70 prisoners’ intake daily and same average number is released on a daily basis. Moreover, an average of 550 prisoners is produced in courts daily,” he said.

The five basic modules developed successfully to cover all aspects of the prison functionality include prisoners’ management, visitors’ management, staff (HR) management, inventory & stock management and accounts & finance management.

“The new 12 modules being developed along with improvements and modifications in existing modules would cover all aspects of the prison functionality, including regional office and inspectorate function management, Punjab Prisons Foundation (PPF) management, Training College management, factory management, diary dispatch management, gate book management, Criminal Record Office (CRO) integration, mega matcher integration, queue management system, canteen management, PCO integration with PMIS and Prisons Inspection app.

Previously, inmates’ data was recorded on registers. Management and retrieval of these records was quite cumbersome. The data included detailed information about legal histories of inmates housed in various prisons. This included the date of their admission, their fingerprints, their court dates, jail transfer, medical histories and parole and crime details.

Published in Daily Times, February  27^th 2018.