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Keraniganj Central Jail

Govt set to spend Tk 324 crore more

Red tape, delay in construction blamed

M Abul Kalam Azad
The government will have to count an extra Tk 324 crore from public exchequer as bureaucratic tangles and legal complications are delaying the construction of Keraniganj central jail, sources in die home ministry said.
They said construction of the 8,200-capacity modern prison would take years lingering sufferings of the inmates crammed into various jails across the country.
Prisoners of the Dhaka Central Jail, die largest but most crowded among 67 prisons, will be shifted to Keraniganj once it is completed.
When the Prisons Directorate floated the "Construction of Keraniganj Central Jail Project” in 2004, the estimated cost for it wasTk 317 crore.
Recently, die project evaluation committee, headed by Additional Secretary to Home Ministry Md Ghulam Hussain, made an estimate of almost double the amount atTk 641 crore.
Officials Involved in the project said the increase was nothing but to adjust the rising costs of construction materials.
The project was aimed at completing the work in five years. Accordingly, a piece of 194-acre land was acquired in Keraniganj, but the bureaucratic tangles took three years to finalise and approve the project.
"The project was approved in an Ecnec meeting in September 2007. But then came the legal complications as four land owners filed writs with the High Court against land acquisition and filling," Deputy Secretary to Home Ministry Abdul I iaque, who is also the project director, told The Daily Star on Friday.
He said the project was to be completed in June 2010.
In response to one of the petitioners, the HC issued an Injunction against filling of any part of the acquired land in 2008, halting the work for several months.
"Besides fighting the legal battle, we carry our works to complete land filling." the project director said adding about 85 percent of acquired land has been filled up so far. “We need more time to finish the task spending about Tk 60 to Tk 65 crore as the land is very low-lying.”
As the project cost doubled. it requires Ecnec approval again. “The proposal is now in the Planning Commission and is expected to be placed in the pre-Ecnec meeting soon,” said the project director, who hoped once the proposal is approved, it would take them four years to start shifting prisoners from the Dhaka Central Jail.
As per the project, there will be two units in the same compound of the Keraniganj jail each having the capacity of 4,000 inmates. There will also be a smaller unit accommodating 200 female prisoners.
"It will be a comprehensive jail and there will also be a 200-bed fully-fledged hospital," said the project director.
He said a master plan for the project has been finalised. "It will be the largest jail in the country."
As part of the plan to move the Dhaka Central Jail, the prisoners under trial will be sent to Keraniganj while convicts and women serving term to the prisons in Kashimpur and Gazipur. About 10,000 prisoners are kept in the country's largest jail against the capacityof2,700.
The move, however, will take time and the prisoners would continue to suffer in the jam-packed jails across the country. Nearly 90,000 prisoners are staying in the country's 67 prisons, which have accommodation for only 27,500.