From Our Bureau
NEW DELHI: Even after four years of the Supreme Court directive to install CCTV cameras in all police stations across the country, they are either not installed or lying useless since they are non-functional.
Apparently the police is reluctant to minitor themselves even while using thousands of the CCTV cameras to conduct surveillance of people on streets and public places.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in compliance with Supreme Court’s direction in April, 2018, had set up a committee to study feasibility of a central server to store CCTV footage. Not much is known since then about initiatives taken by the MHA or the states in this direction.
The MHA, which justified the amendment in Criminal Identification Bill to allow the police to collect ‘measurements’ of all suspects, detainees, the arrested and the undertrials—including their DNA and semen samples, appears clueless on ‘policing the police’.
The issue acquires significance in the wake of several recent cases of excesses by policemen. This week itself an SHO in Lalitpur (Uttar Pradesh) has been accused of raping a rape survivor in the police station. In the same district another policeman has been accused of stripping a woman and administering third degree on her because some Tantrik had declared that the woman, a maid, had stolen articles missing from the policeman’s home.
The issue acquires significance in the wake of several recent cases of excesses by policemen. This week itself an SHO in Lalitpur (Uttar Pradesh) has been accused of raping a rape survivor in the police station. In the same district another policeman has been accused of stripping a woman and administering third degree on her because some Tantrik had declared that the woman, a maid, had stolen articles mossing from the policeman’s home.
