By Saman Indrajith

Prison Management and Prisoners Rehabilitation State Minister Lohan Ratwatte says the government is planning to release about 8,000 prisoners as a solution to the problem of congestion in the prisons.

Ratwatte made the announcement at the inaugural meeting of the Justice Ministry Consultative Committee in the parliamentary complex on Saturday.

Minister Ratwatte said that there were 28,951 inmates in 28 prisons across the country. President Gotabaya Rajapaksa had issued a directive to release inmates eligible for a pardon, given the COVID situation. A Cabinet paper had been submitted by the Justice Ministry to re-introduce a four-year pardon scheme which had not been in practice for nearly 20 years. The paper also proposed that all death row prisoners who had served more than 20 years be released, Minister Ratwatte said, adding that the Ministry intended to pay the minor fines on behalf of prisoners who were in prison due to their inability to pay them.

Commissioner General of Prisons Thushara Upuldeniya said that there were around 10,500 inmates related to drug related offences. Of them, 8,500 were in the prisons for heroin-related offences.

Justice Minister Ali Sabry said those convicted of drug offences should be rehabilitated instead of being incarcerated. In most cases, it was not the drug dealer who was convicted, but those who had fallen prey to them.

As regards laws delays, Minister emphasised that Sri Lanka ranked in the 165th position out of the 189 countries of the world. Adding to it the Minister said it had come to his attention that more than 5,000 civil cases were pending in the Sri Lankan District Courts which had not been resolved for over 25 years.

Minister Sabry said that the number of the Supreme Court judges had been increased from 11 to 17 and the number of Court of Appeal judges from 12 to 20 and such action had not been taken for 42 years.

The Minister said that the Cabinet approval had been granted to shift the Ministry located in Hulftsdorp from its present location make more space available to the judiciary.

State Minister Ratwatte and 14 MPs including Weerasumana Weerasinghe, Charles Nirmalanathan, Diana Gamage, M. S. Thowfeek, Udayana Kirindigoda, Madhura Vithanage, S. Kajendran, Sudath Manjula, Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, Sagara Kariyawasam were present at the Ministerial Consultative Committee on Justice chaired by Minister Sabry.