THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:The Police Department is toying with the idea of deputing three civil police officers as technical staff in each station to look after the technical matters pertaining to the department. The idea behind the move is to provide enough manpower to run the ‘smart stations’, a concept launched by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the annual conference of DGPs at Guwahati in 2014.
The technical staff will be responsible for spreading awareness on various apps developed by the police and for maintaining the communication devices and other electronic gadgets in the station. They will also have to make an inventory of those devices and inform the higher-ups if there are glitches in the devices.
The decision to field officers exclusively to look after technical aspects comes close on the heels of the observation that most of the initiatives launched by the police in this front are yet to reach the grassroots.
“We are pumping in a lot of technology, but it is not reaching the ground. That’s why we have decided to put policemen in stations exclusively to look after technical aspects,” said State Police Chief Loknath Behera.
One of the CPOs will look after the maintenance of the hardware and software, while the other will be in charge of cyber and forensic cases. The third person will look after communication devices.So far, about 600 officers have undergone an in-house training programme to learn the nuances of the job. “The manpower crunch is a reality and it’s tough to find people for the job, but there is no other way forward,” Behera said.
Express had earlier reported the decision to carve out a technical cadre in the police department. The current move to deploy technical staff in police stations is viewed as a build up before the announcement of the technical cadre.