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Following the Good Friday blasts inside the historic Jama Masjid, there were reports of Delhi Police discussing with mosque managements the installation of CCTVs at entrances and premises of mosques in Delhi. A majority of the capital’s important temples have already been brought under CCTV cover, but not a single mosque has this facility yet. CCTVs for policing are not new in Delhi. Introduced in the Traffic Department in the late 70s, there’re in use for over 35 years now. The initial five cameras installed atop tall buildings like Vikas Minar, Delhi Police Headquarters, the NDMC tower, etc. helped monitor busy traffic junctions over IP Marg, Tilak Marg and Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, the Parliament Street, and Kasturba Gandhi Marg/Connaught Place near Statesman/Scindia House. The scheme remained stagnant though for the next thirty odd years, when around the turn of the new millennium a burst of fresh initiative by Delhi’s then Traffic managers saw the first of three speed-check cum red-light-jumping detection cameras come on the scene. Soon followed by extending the facility of camera surveillance from traffic control exclusively, also to the crime control arena. The areas to benefit with permanent camera fixtures were Parliament Street where political and highly volatile and controversial public agitations, demonstrations and related violence is the order of the day; and the vulnerable banking and jewellery market areas of Karol Bagh, where traders were motivated to partner Delhi Police in the venture. Sadar Bazar and Chandni Chowk too followed suit to benefit from camera surveillance. In
the meantime the police modernisation scheme for upgrading of
police stations, saw CCTVs introduced in all police stations of
Delhi to facilitate monitoring by senior officials of crucial
public dealing areas like Duty Officers’ rooms, lock-ups,
interrogation rooms and such other pockets the monitoring of which
is considered crucial for management and administration. So in the USA, the NYPD have deployed this month the first of 500 Security Cameras, launching their ambitious plan to combat street crime and terrorism. Wireless video cameras now peer down from lamp posts about 30 feet above the sidewalk. These 500 cameras when placed throughout the city will cost $9 million. New York has plans for hundreds more to safeguard Lower Manhattan and parts of midtown with a surveillance "ring of steel" at an additional cost of $81.5 million modelled after security measures in London's financial district. The city already has about 1,000 cameras in the subways, with 2,100 scheduled to be in place by 2008. An additional 3,100 cameras monitor city housing projects. Elsewhere in the US, Chicago spent roughly $5 million on a 2,000-camera system. Homeland Security officials in Washington plan to spend $9.8 million for surveillance cameras and sensors on a rail line near the Capitol. And Philadelphia has increasingly relied on video surveillance. While privacy advocates react saying the camera plan needs more study and safeguards to preserve privacy and guard against abuses like racial profiling and voyeurism, police officials insist that law-abiding New Yorkers have nothing to fear because the cameras will be restricted to public areas. Supporting the police move, specialists feel the measures make sense – as law enforcement needs to use whatever tools they can to keep the city safe. April 24, 2006: 950 words: Copy Right © Maxwell Pereira: 3725 Sec-23, Gurgaon-122002. You can interact with the author at http:// www.maxwellperira.com and maxpk@vsnl.com
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