BENGALURU: The Railway Protection Force (RPF) unit in Bengaluru will soon have four state-of-the-art drones that will be stationed permanently within the division, and put to use for surveillance activities, particularly crowd management and anti-sabotage activities. Two drones each will be stationed at Yesvantpur and Krantivira Sangolli Rayanna stations.
A source told TNIE the drones will have in-built face recognition software. “Tenders will be called soon and we plan to start operating them by November. This will be the first time the division is getting drones to monitor operations in Bengaluru,” the source said.
Though two drones have been provided for the South Western Railway zone, they are despatched whenever there is a requirement for high surveillance. “It will assist in railway track patrolling work to detect any problems. Any trouble caused by miscreants, like placing stones on the tracks, can be captured by these drones,” the source said, adding that the drones can reach heights ranging from 6 feet to 50 feet.
The operations will be controlled at the 24x7 Integrated Command and Control Room at KSR station. The RPF is also looking at nabbing repeat offenders using drones. “The recent move initiated by us to offer coupons to ensure seats in general compartments using biometric technology and face capture, will help us. The images captured by drones can be cross-checked with our database,” the source said.