KARACHI, Aug 1: The Sindh High Court was informed on Monday that the provincial government had allocated Rs80 million for the Sindh Aids Control Programme.

This was stated by the provincial additional finance secretary before Justice Aqeel Ahmed Abbasi of the SHC, who was hearing an application filed by Syed Iqbal Kazmi of the Human Rights Commission, South Asia, against irregularities in prisons and non-provision of health facilities to inmates, particularly HIV/Aids patients.

Additional Finance Secretary Abid Qureshi filed a statement in court submitting that Rs30 million and Rs42.462 million had qbeen allocated for the HIV/Aids programme in year 2009-10 and 2010-11 and both the funds were released by the finance department.He said that an amount of Rs80 million had been allocated in year 2011-12 for the purpose. However, since no request for release of funds had been sent from the health department, no amount was released so far, he added.

The provincial manager of the Aids programme submitted that he came to know through the statement of the additional finance secretary about the current allocation of funds amounting Rs80 million and said that he would issue a letter to the department concerned and soon after the disbursement of the funds the same would be utilised for the screening of the prisoners.

Justice Abbasi directed all departments concerned to do the needful within a reasonable time without any delay and submit the progress report as to what steps were taken in compliance of the court order.

The applicant submitted that the provincial prisons' chief did not submit the compliance report and expressed apprehension that if prisoners living with HIV/Aids were released without intimating the authorities of the Aids programme their follow-up treatment could be difficult and may not be taken properly.

The court directed the Sindh prisons chief to file comments regarding the court direction within three weeks and put off the hearing to a date to be later fixed by the court's office.