LAHORE: Pakistan is sending 20 probation, parole and prison officers to the United States of America for training in electronic monitoring and the supervision of high-risk and gang-linked offenders, its second such delegation in two months, as the province Punjab looks for ways to supervise more offenders outside its badly overcrowded jails.
The officers, from the Punjab Probation and Parole Service and the Prisons Department, will attend a two-week training-of-trainers programme in Virginia from Oct 24 to Nov 8, run with the Virginia Department of Corrections. The US State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) is funding the programme, and the Punjab government will bear no cost, the Home Department said.
Sixteen senior probation officers completed the same programme in September, each returning with an action plan for reforms that could be adapted in Punjab. With this group, 36 officers will have been trained in Virginia this year.
The course covers electronic monitoring, GPS-based supervision and technology-driven offender management, with specialised modules on high-risk offenders and people linked to gangs. It is built around the principle of “Rehabilitate, Reform and Reintegrate” and evidence-based supervision methods.
Home Secretary Dr Ahmad Javed Qazi told the officers on Wednesday that Punjab’s probation, parole and prison systems were being brought in line with international standards, and that the training would help manage high-risk offenders and strengthen counterterrorism efforts. The officers would be ambassadors for Pakistan as well as trainees, he said.
On their return, the officers will take supervisory roles in districts and help improve the Offender Management Information System, the probation service’s digital case-tracking platform. All were given preliminary training before departure. Special Secretary Home Zainab Khan, Inspector General of Prisons Mian Salik Jalal and senior prison psychologist Saadia Zafar attended the briefing.
The pressure for alternatives to prison is acute. Punjab’s 44 jails held about 74,000 inmates against capacity for 39,304 in September, and around four in five were awaiting trial. Supervising more convicts in the community, with tracking where needed, is one of the few levers available to ease that load.
Electronic tagging is already on the province’s agenda. In 2025, the Home Department approved 1,500 tracking devices for habitual offenders and people on the Fourth Schedule terrorism watchlist, 900 of them for the Counter Terrorism Department and 100 for the parole department. Officials have not said how many are in use.
The training is part of a wider prison overhaul that includes a real-time digital dashboard for jails and literacy and skills programmes for inmates. After the first delegation returned in September, the secretary also promised a mobile application to monitor people released on probation; the Home Department has not confirmed whether it has launched.
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