Srinagar, Nov 27: The Jammu & Kashmir government has authorised director general of police  (DGP)(prisons) to extend special parole of convicts by eight more weeks if the COVID-19 pandemic situation in the UT does not improve or further worsens.

According to an order issued by Home department of J&K Union Territory,, DGP Prisons has been empowered to further extend parole by eight more weeks.

“In exercise of the powers conferred under sub-section (5) of section 432 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. 1973 and in continuation of the Government Order No. 1OO-Home of 2020 dated 02-04-2020 and Government Order No. 154-Home of 2020 dated 29-07-2020. sanction is hereby accorded to the authorization of the Director General of Police (Prisons), J&K, being the competent Authority under the Jammu and Kashmir Suspension of Sentence Rules, 2020. notified vide S.0-114 dated 29-03-2020, to grant special parole for another eight weeks, in respect of categories of convict prisoners mentioned in the order ibid, extendable for further eight weeks, If the COVID-19 pandemic situation in the UT of JK does not improve or further worsens. subject to the conditions laid dawn in Government Order No. 1OO-Home of 2020 dated 02-04-2020,” reads the order.

On April 1, a three-member high-powered committee, headed by J&K state legal services authority, executive chairman Justice Rajesh Bindal, and having principal secretary (Home) Shaleen Kabra and DGP (Prisons) V K Singh as its members, passed directions for the release of jail inmates, except those involved in militancy-related cases to decongest the prisons in the Union Territory.