BBMP too wants to police the city but cops are clueless

BENGALURU: There's a new cop aspirant in town wanting to compete with Bengaluru City Police.

Bengaluru civic corporation or BBMP--never mind its lethargic track record in civic maintenance--is preparing to install surveillance cameras in all the 198 wards in the city through its new Haddina Kannu (Hawk's Eye) scheme, duplicating police work.The otherwise cash-starved civic body has in its budget for 2016-17 allocated Rs 20 crore to install CCTV cameras across the city , at about Rs 10 lakh per ward. M Shivaraju, chairperson of BBMP's taxation and finance standing committee who presented the budget in March, said the objective was to prevent crime and provide security to the citizens. "These CCTV cameras will be connected to the ward offices in each ward. We will depute staff to monitor the feeds. If anything unusual is seen, the jurisdictional police will be informed," he said.

Well, the police don't know. "Neither the elected representatives nor (BBMP) officials have discussed anything with us regarding the installation of CCTVs," Police Commissioner NS Megharikh said."We know the sensitive areas in the city. If the BBMP consults us, we can work together."

The police already keep vigil across the city through 100 surveillance cameras installed by its law and order department and through another set of 175 cameras installed by the traffic police. BBMP wants to install its cameras at parks, bus shelters and other public areas.

What BBMP intends to do is clearly a duplication of police work, said DCP (Command Control) MG Nagendra Kumar. "The traffic management centre monitors feed from cameras in traffic junctions. The command centre does the same with cameras covering roads and other public places. We have a dedicated team that alerts the jurisdic tional police or Hoysala patrol vehicles in the event of any suspicious activity," Kumar said. The police command centre that he heads has no intimation about BBMP's plans, he said.

Despite BBMP's ambitions, an allocation of Rs 10 lakh per ward may be insufficient. "The cameras installed by the police are pan-tiltzoom cameras with a zoom range of 500 metres. These cost about Rs 57,000. With Rs 10 lakh, one can install only five or six of these cameras. Cabling and monitoring systems alone cost Rs 3 lakh," said Shivakumar MR, technical incharge at I Focus Technologies, a supplier of security equipment.