Five more central jails to come up in Uttar Pradesh

The Uttar Pradesh government has decided to construct five more Central jails in the state to reduce overcrowding, officials said here today. 

The new jails will come up at Lucknow, Kanpur, Jhansi, Gorakhpur and Meerut and the concerned district magistrates had been asked to identify the land for the prisons, additional director general (Jails) VK Gupta said here yesterday.

The state presently has jails at Bareily, Agra Fatehpur, Nani (Allahabad) and Varanasi.

The total capacity of all the jails is about 6,890 prisoners but there are about 13,500 inmates lodged in them.