COIMBATORE: In a bid to enhance the surveillance system in the city, the Coimbatore city police has recently changed the crime prevention approach from taking financial help from volunteers to directly involving people living in an area, as they believe it will reduce their workload of maintaining the surveillance system.
As part of this, under ‘Nam Pathugappu Nam Kadamai’ (our safety our responsibility) programme, city police commissioner V Balakrishnan on Saturday inaugurated 30 CCTV cameras, which were installed with the participation of residents, in the stretch between Sungam junction and Ramanathapuram.
After inauguration the cameras, city police commissioner V Balakrishnan appealed to public and business entities to come forward in setting up and maintaining CCTV cameras in their respective areas. “Earlier, we used to set up CCTV cameras with financial help from volunteers. However, it caused a setback in maintenance as the public didn’t make efforts to keep the cameras in good health. On the other hand, if it is installed with their donation, they will be more conscious of it and it will eliminate maintenance issues,” he told TNIE.
Further, he said around 30,000 cameras are installed across Coimbatore city of which 15,000 cameras are road facing. “We have fixed all types of cameras like automatic number plate recognition, meta data and facial recognition facilities. We are working to bring as much space in the city under CCTV surveillance as possible,” Balakrishnan said.
Further, police have started geo-tagging the places where CCTV cameras are available. Sources said geo-tagging will help them to obtain footage soon after any crime occurs. “Personnel attached to all 18 Law & Order police stations are engaged in the work of geo-tagging CCTV cameras. We are also tagging the places where there are no CCTV cameras,” said police sources.