Juvenile Engagement in Socio-Economic Rehabilitation and Its Effect on Recidivism: A Study of Borstal Institutes in Punjab

Abstract

Juvenile recidivism has continued to pose a challenging phenomenon within the Punjab correctional system of Pakistan. The causes of juvenile recidivism are related to poverty, family disintegration, educational problems, and lack of follow up, among other stress factors leading to re-offenses. In the Punjab province, there are two Borstal institutions, which include the Borstal institute and Juvenile jail in Bahawalpur & Faisalabad. The two institutions are obligated by the laws of Pakistan to rehabilitate the offenders through various trainings, education, and psycho-social counseling. There appears to be no empirical research findings concerning the efficiency of such rehabilitation efforts among the offenders. The current study investigated the influence of socio-economic rehabilitation among the juveniles in terms of recidivism involving 141 offenders aged between 12-18 years from the two institutions. Data were collected through designed questionnaire while analysis was carried out using descriptive statistics, chi-square test, and multivariate logistic regression using IBM SPSS Statistics Version 26.0. Findings revealed that 28.7% of the offenders involved in rehabilitation programmes had experienced recidivism in contrast to 75.0% among those who were not undergoing rehabilitation programmes; this indicates a statistical significance of 46.3 percentage points (χ²=28.974; p<.001; φ=.447; medium to large effect size). The logistic regression model showed that rehabilitation programme involvement (OR=.112), post-release employment (OR=.146), family support (OR=.864), psychological counseling (OR=.501), and community acceptance (OR=.590) were the significant predictors of non-recidivism. It is pertinent to note that all the 141 offenders were first-time offenders and 94.3% were violent offenders indicating need for intense intervention approaches. The overall two-year recidivism rate was 41.8%. This finding holds great significance for juvenile justice policies and institutions within Punjab.