NEW DELHI: The Delhi government will begin the work to retrofit its buses with panic buttons, CCTV cameras, and Global Positioning System (GPS) from Tuesday. It hopes to finish the project by the end of the year, Transport Minister Kailash Gahlot said Monday.
The government is upgrading the fleet of around 5,500 old Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) and Cluster buses to provide a safe travel experience to passengers, especially women.
“The work will start from September 1 and pick up pace in the next three-four days. It will help strengthen our efforts to provide safer travel to passengers, especially women, in public transport,” Gahlot said.
The project was approved by the Delhi Cabinet in December last year, but the work was halted due to the pandemic.
“Each bus will be fitted with three CCTV cameras and 10 panic buttons and GPS. The project is estimated to cost Rs 150 crore,” said a transport department official.
The GPS feature will enable the department to come up with an app-based live bus information system. The department is already working on a mobile app for contactless ticketing and the feature of tracking buses will be integrated into it, he said.
Once the entire system is put in place, information such as location, time of arrival, etc.— will be displayed on the bus stops across the city, he said. New standard and low floor buses being procured by the Transport Department come equipped with these features.
Under the project, there is a provision for a centralised command room to control and monitor the entire system through GPS locations of the buses and footage from CCTV cameras inside them.
With agency inputs