The State government has allocated `95 lakh to the Tamil Nadu Police Academy to purchase three unmanned aerial vehicles from Anna University. The Academy and the University will soon sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in this regard.
The fund has been allocated to give effect to the announcement made by Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa during the Conference of District Collectors and Police Officers last year.
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles are increasingly being deployed by law enforcement agencies across the world for operational purposes such as crowd management, route
or area surveillance and jungle operations.
It is proposed to undertake ‘Development of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles for law and order management as the first research and development project under an MoU.
“The transfer of knowledge and other collaboration with Anna University will be free of cost. The MoU shall be in the interest of developing skills of the police personnel in the relevant area of engineering and technology,” the government order (GO) issued in this regard on December 11 said. The MoU will be valid for a period of five years from the date of signing.
The GO further said, “any hardware and software design, architecture, material, product specifications, designs, financial information, technical documents, shall be deemed to be in the private domain and it shall not be made public or shared with any other party without the prior written consent of the party which owns it.”
The UAVs were used in Paramakudi, during the annual anniversary of Dalit leader Immanuel Sekaran and in Tiruvannamalai during ‘Karthigai Deepam’.