For the first time, a prison in the Pakistani megacity of Karachi has started offering Mandarin Chinese classes to up-skill inmates and give them a chance at a “better life” when they are released, jail officials said on Monday.
Karachi Central Jail, a high-security prison where 5,843 prisoners are housed in barracks meant for 2,400, was once notorious for incarcerating the most unredeemable class of criminals and had a reputation for being a brutal holding pen.
However, the prison has now started offering Mandarin classes in the hope of giving inmates the skills they need to lead a better life.
The prison has introduced new rehabilitation programs in recent years to help ease the tedium of life behind bars and impart new skills to inmates.
Computer science and English lessons are offered at the facility, and in January of this year, a convicted murderer jailed at the prison, Syed Naeem Shah, earned a prestigious chartered accountancy scholarship.
Last month, the prison launched Mandarin Chinese classes at its ‘Alkhidmat Computer Training and English Language Center.’ The teacher is Farhan Niazi, himself an inmate, and he has thirty students.
“This Chinese language class, we started a month ago, is one of those programs to enable inmates to live a normal and better life as good citizens after they are released,” jail superintendent Hasan Sehto told Arab News on Monday.
The new edition of the Chinese language class is in response to the growing demand and need for the language with the increasing amount of projects being done in Pakistan under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. Sehto stated that learning the Chinese language would help create more job opportunities for Pakistanis in this growing market.
Niazi, who worked as a Chinese language interpreter and translator, said that he plans to train at least three teachers who can continue teaching the classes after he is released.
“I acquired a three-year education in the language in China, but the six-month-long course we are teaching here will help the inmates have a command over the language and use this skill in getting jobs,” Niazi told Arab News.
Muhammad Hanzala, an under-trial prisoner in his twenties, said that learning a language is better than just passing time in jail purposelessly.
“The mistakes you have made may not be undone,” his teacher Niazi chipped in, “but inmates can learn, they can acquire a skill or two and make a better life for themselves once they are free.”
*Names of inmates have been changed to protect identities.
