A map of road-facing CCTV cameras in its jurisdiction, which will give a glance of the surveillance coverage in the city, is one of the next big projects of Coimbatore City Police, says Commissioner of Police Sumit Sharan.
The map will help the police identify road-facing cameras in a particular locality in the event of an emergency. As of now, 2,500 surveillance cameras are part of the map and the number will increase in the coming days.
“The main aim of the initiative is to ensure that all important places and roads are brought under surveillance. All exit points of the city willbe covered with this kind of network that will help the police in law and order management and crime detection,” says Mr. Sharan.
While feeds from 200 cameras on major junctions and other important places are connected to the modern control room of the city police, the remaining cameras are part of small networks that are maintained by residential associations and other bodies.
“Inspectors of all the 15 law and order police stations in the city have been tasked to identify places where small networks can be created at a minimum cost. Each network will have a minimum of 50 cameras. Already such networks have been established by the R.S. Puram, Saibaba Colony and Peelamedu police stations. Also, a personnel in each police station will regularly identify road-facing cameras in the jurisdiction and mark them on the map and keep it updated,” he said.
In the last few months, around 400 cameras were added to the surveillance network in the city under the initiative.
Compared to Coimbatore central and east zones, west and south zones are lagging behind in camera presence.
“While major roads under east and central zones namely Avinashi Road, Tiruchi Road, Mettupalayam Road and Sathyamangalam Road have better surveillance coverage, Palakkad and Pollachi roads coming under west and south zones are lagging behind. Keeping this in mind, the police are working towards creating more networks on the two major stretches and other roads in the two zones. A new network will come up in Coimbatore south soon,” said a senior police officer.
The police are looking for more residents’ associations and traders’ associations to contribute to the network.
“The cost of installing surveillance camera network has reduced significantly. A network can be established in an area of two to three acres with less than ₹ 2 lakh. Smaller networks can be set up in ₹ 1 lakh. Residents associations can easily meet the budget and set up networks in their locality to step up safety and also to aid the police,” said R. Raveendran, honorary secretary of Residents Awareness Association of Coimbatore.
While the conventional method involves linking of cameras with wires, digital video recorder and monitors, WiFi enabled cameras with advanced features are currently available in market.
“Now the WiFi bill for a month is hardly ₹ 2,000 and feeds from WiFi enabled cameras can be viewed even on mobile phones and tablets. We are planning to set up such an advanced network in our residential area,” said Mr. Raveendran, a resident of G.V. Residency near Peelamedu.
Apart from residential areas, the police are also urging business establishments and educational institutions to join in the initiative.
On Monday, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime) P. Perumal held a meeting with the managements of Fun Mall, PSG Institute of Technology, PSG Hospital, and Prozone Mall to discuss the prospects of installing road-facing cameras on their premises.