Traders demand effective night patrols to prevent burglaries

Traders’ organisations in the city have urged the police to put in place effective night surveillance system to prevent burglaries.

Though the police claim that they deploy eight flying squads and 12 mobile patrol units for night surveillance in the city, traders’ forums allege that the squads are hardly sufficient to meet the additional security requirements in areas such as S.M. Street, where the number of shops prone to burglary is high. Merchants say they cannot afford security guards or expensive surveillance cameras.

Leaders of the Small Scale Building and Tenants Association in the city say they have submitted a memorandum to District Police Chief (Kozhikode city) Kaliraj Mahesh Kumar on the issue. At Baby Bazaar where thieves recently targeted a few shops, merchants are planning to appoint a security guard till the strengthening of the police patrol, they add.

The Kozhikode District Merchants’ Association has also called for a revision of the existing night patrol plan in such a way to offer better protection to the commercial establishments in the heart of the city. P. Joshy Paul, general secretary of the association, points out that there are more than 100 shops at Baby Bazaar alone, where the strengthening of night patrol is very crucial to check shoplifting attempts.

Some of the traders from the city point out that the electronic beat system earlier planned by the police with Radio Frequency Identification Cards is yet to become a reality in streamlining the conventional beat registers. If RFID-enabled beat patrolling comes into existence, authorities can effectively track the night patrol records and pull up those who casually do the job, they add.

Supporting the traders’ demand, the Kozhikode Taluk Development Samiti too asked the police to have a thorough look at the flaws in the existing night patrol plan. At a recent meeting, Samiti members observed that the poor night vigil was creating insecurity among the city residents as well.

When contacted, an officer at the police control room claimed that city patrol squads covered all the locations listed out to them by the District Police Chief for night patrol. “S.M. Street is always there in the list and any additional security requirement sought by the traders can be considered with the approval of the District Police Chief,” he says.