Jinping's anti-graft drive turns Chinese jail space-less

Beijing, February 14: Chinese Preident Xi Jinping's anti-graft drive, which began in 2012, has netted 1.3 million corrupt officials in jail. The overcrowding has led to the cancellation of the Lunar New Year celebrations in the prison.

"The prison used to allow inmates over 60 to have a meal in jail with a limited number of their immediate family members ahead of the Lunar New Year. Some of them will have a hotpot, others bring dumplings, whatever they like," the State run newspaper South China Morning Post reported.

"But this year, the prison has canceled the celebration with family – and not only that, they've also barred visitors for all inmates for the fortnight leading up to and following the new year," report added.

The report also quoted the relative of a top official who has been jailed in Qincheng since 2013 as saying: "He told me there were no more than six inmates in his area when he arrived. Now, because of the crackdown, there are more than 20 people in the block."

The Qincheng maximum security prison was founded in 1958 to house political prisoners from the Kuomintang or the Nationalist Party, which was the arch-rival of the Communist Party. Political prisoners from the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 were also jailed here.

Overall, around 1.3 million government officials of all ranks roughly 0.1 percent of the 1.38 billion Chinese population, or one out of every 1,000 Chinese have been arrested or sentenced for corruption, according to a report by the South China Morning Post.

The Communist Party all but stamped out organized crime after it took control of China in 1949. But many think the remnants of these groups have managed to maintain a fair amount of control, particularly outside China's major cities.