An Analysis of Prisons’ Staff Role in the Reintegration of the Prisoners

The central theme of this research is to explore the effectiveness of prisons staff in the reintegration of the prisoners with specific focus on Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (Pakistan) jails. Mixed method was adopted to carry out the study.  Seven high-profile jails within Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan, one jail each, in all the seven administrative divisions, were purposively selected.  Of all 277 respondents, 250 comprised of jail inmates (under trial and convicted adults and juveniles male prisoners) were randomly selected within the seven jails of the province and interviewed through semi-structured questionnaire.  The remaining 27 respondents, purposively selected and interviewed through interview-guide included judges, lawyers, jail officials, human right activists and ex-prisoners.  Further, One focus group discussion was arranged to gain more deep insight into the phenomenon in question. Concurrent triangulation strategy was adopted for the collection and analysis of data.       It was found that prison staff in Pakistan is characterized by lack of will and skill to transform prisons into correction institutions. Their involvement in torturing the inmates, providing them proscribed stuff, sexual assaults on the prisoners, taking bribery for extending legal and illegal favors etc is deeply-seated within the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa prisons. Providing best trainings to the prisons’ staff considering modern-day needs, their salaries increase along with sound service structure, meritorious selection, transfer and up-gradation of the prisons’ employees, recruitment of the needed staff to bridge the staff-inmate huge gape and ensuring the effective accountability system of prisons are the suggested measures to overcome the problem at hand.

Mitigating the Effect of Salinity and Drought Stress in Wheat Triticum Aestivum L. Through Combined Application of Rhizobacteria Containing Acc- Deaminase and Organic Amendment

Global rise in temperature is leading to soil salinity and drought which are big threats to agriculture. The salinity and drought stresses stimulate the synthesis of ethylene level known as stress ethylene. The 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate (ACC) is an immediate precursor of ethylene biosynthesis in higher plants through methionine pathway. The application of ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacteria could be effective to ameliorate the adverse effects of salinity and drought stresses. The ACC-deaminase cleaves the ACC into ammonia and α-ketobutyrate that could suppress the accelerated endogenous ethylene biosynthesis. In addition to rhizobacteria, the biogas slurry (BGS) can add the organic matter to soil which can act as a rich substrate for soil residing microbial community. Further, the BGS could improve soil structure through aggregation of soil particles that can result in more water holding capacity of soil under drought condition. Therefore, we hypothesized that the integrated application rhizobacteria and organic amendment can be an effective approach to mitigating the salinity and drought stress for better crop productivity. For this purpose, series of experiments were conducted to evaluate rhizobacteria and BGS role under artificial and natural salinity and drought conditions. Initially the isolation, screening, identification and characterization of most efficient salinity tolerant ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacteria were conducted under axenic condition. Salinity stress severely reduced the various growth parameters of wheat (Triticum aestivum L.). However, the inoculation of ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacteria had a considerable positive impact on stress tolerance index (STI), shoot and root growth and shoot and root fresh and dry weight of wheat seedlings as compared to uninoculated control. In comparison to uninoculated, the strain S15 increased the STI i.e., up to 90.8% while S4 enhanced i.e., up to 82.8% and S46 strain increased i.e., up to 66.4% at 12 dS m-1 EC level, respectively. Our results showed that, the ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacterial strains might be used as an effective tool for enhancing plant growth under salinity stress. A pot experiment was conducted in which the wheat seeds were inoculated with the rhizobacterial strains i.e. Alcaligenes faecalis S4 (Accession # NR_113606.1) Bacillus cereus S15 (Accession # NR_115714.1) and Lysinibacillus fusiformis S46 (Accession # NR_042072.1). The BGS was applied at the rate of 600 kg/ha as an organic amendment. At 9 dS m-1 EC level, the plant growth was adversely reduced as compared to normal EC. The ACC- deaminase containing rhizobacteria with BGS improved the shoot and root length i.e., up to 39.6 and 33.6% of wheat plants, respectively, as compared to respective uninoculated controls. The leaf sap analysis revealed that potassium ion (K+) concentration was significantly improved in rhizobacteria + BGS treatments at all salinity levels as compared to uninoculated control. This study revealed that the BGS application with the Lysinibacillus fusiformis and Bacillus cereus strains were more effective in combination for improving growth and yield of wheat under saline condition. After pot experiment, the field experiments were conducted to evaluate the effect of ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacterial strains and BGS individually and in combination on physiological, growth and yield attributes of wheat at salt-affected fields. The results showed that the inoculation with ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacterial strains improved the growth and yield attributes of wheat crop more effectively as compared to uninoculated control. The application of BGS + Bacillus cereus increased the stomatal conductance (up to 47%) and sub stomatal conductance (up to 43%) as compared to corresponding uninoculated controls. Similarly the drought experiments were conducted to evaluate the potential of ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacteria and BGS to mitigate the adverse effects of drought stress on wheat crop. In drought screening experiment, the efficient strains showing improved wheat seedling growth under drought stress condition were screened out, identified and characterized. The ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacteria had a positive influence on various physiological parameters of wheat and drought tolerance index (DTI) as compared to uninoculated control. The Alcaligenes faecalis, Pseudomonas moraviensis and Bacillus amyloliquefaciens strains enhanced the DTI of wheat seedlings i.e., up to 62.5, 58.8 and 55.3% at 15% poly-ethylene glycol (PEG), respectively, as compared to uninoculated control. In pot experiment, wheat seeds were inoculated with strains of Alcaligenes faecalis S4 (Accession # NR_113606.1) and Pseudomonas moraviensis S17 (Accession # FN597644.1) and Bacillus amyloliquefaciens S27 (Accession # NR_043314.1) alone and combination with BGS and subjected to drought stress at different water holding capacity (WHC) levels. The data revealed that the drought stress adversely effected the growth, biochemical and yield attributes of wheat. However, the application of ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacteria with BGS amendment enhanced the wheat growth under drought stressed condition. At 50% WHC level, the inoculation of Pseudomonas moraviensis strain amended with BGS resulted in significant increase the grain and biological yield i.e., up to 46.7 and 40.5%, respectively, over the respective uninoculated controls. The inoculation amended with BGS also improved the nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium contents in grains and straw. It was concluded that the application of ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacteria amended with BGS could efficiently enhance the productivity of the wheat crop under water deficit conditions. Next to pot experiment a field study was conducted under skipped irrigation situations. The irrigation was skipped at tillering (SIT) and flowering (SIF) stages while control was maintained with the recommended four irrigations. The result of this field study showed that the rhizobacterial strains inoculation + BGS significantly improved the photosynthetic rate (up to 73.9%), stomatal conductance (up to 98%), sub-stomatal CO2 concentration (up to 46%) and transpiration rate (up to 38%) at skipped irrigation conditions, respectively, over respective uninoculated control. The Pseudomonas moraviensis + BGS treatment, significantly increased the plant height and grain yield up to 24.3 and 30.3%, respectively, over uninoculated controls where irrigation was skipped at tillering stage. The results depicted that Pseudomonas moraviensis + BGS treatment could be effectively used to improve the growth, physiology and yield of wheat crop under drought stress condition. The rhizobacteria strains also contained exopolysaccharides, catalase activity, phosphate solubilization and indole acetic acid production activity. These additional attributes also helped in improving the wheat growth under stressed conditions. Overall series of experiments showed that the ACC-deaminase containing rhizobacteria and BGS have the ability to provide resistance to wheat crop under abiotic stresses by decreasing the biosynthesis of ethylene.