Amritsar Central Jail stall earns accolades

While making rounds of various halls set up at Punjab International Trade Expo – 2024 (PITEX), most of the visitors were made to stop for a while at a stall that stood apart from the rest and it was Amritsar Central Jail stall.

It was strange for visitors to see such a stall as at a trade expo only major brands and well-established businessmen put up their stalls showing their merchandise.

However, the stall set up by the Amritsar Central Jail became one of the main centres of attraction in this year’s famous trade expo. The stall put on display handmade products — Phulkari, embroidery, crotia work, sofy toys, candle, etc — created by jail inmates.

This is for the second time that a stall was established by the jail authorities in the PITEX trade fair after almost five years.

The items here were low-priced earning low profit margins. It showed efforts were being made to rehabilitate prisoners to bring them back to the mainstream by training them in various courses, including stitching, embroidery, candle making, plumbing, agriculture and horticulture, being run by the Punjab Government and under national skill development programmes.

“As far as women prisoners are concerned, we are imparting them training in stitching, embroidery, beauty parlour course, candle and pickle making while men are being trained in plumbing and agriculture courses. We also pay them under the skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled categories as per their daily work,” said Hemant Sharma, Superintendent of Amritsar Central Jail.

“The stall had displayed an array of handmade towels, bed sheets, apparels for men and women, soft toys, handmade soaps and all products were made by jail inmates,” he said.