Police, IIT Mandi to work on women safety, drug menace

Tribune News Service

Shimla, January 2

The Himachal Pradesh Police and the IIT, Mandi, have decided to focus on crime against women and children, road safety, analysis of illicit drug trafficking nexus in their collaboration.

At a meeting between the HP Police and IIT, Mandi, DGP Sanjay Kundu emphasised on the use of technology and research to solve day-to-day problems faced by people. Presentations were made from both sides to understand the issues and acquaint each other with the work being done by each team. This was followed by intense discussions on various potential spheres of collaboration and inter-organisational requirements.

One of the issues discussed at the meeting was data mining. It meant using the data verticals generated by police teams and design a robust search engine for investigation, intelligence and crime prevention. The other important topic was that of Surveillance Grid – creating a template for surveillance using CCTV cameras, vehicle information and facial recognition of offenders.

A Drone Surveillance Grid, use of deep machine learning and artificial intelligence for traffic and crowd management during major bandobasts and other unique incidents was also discussed.

The other issues taken up included the integration of multiple verticals and applications, i.e. CCTNS and mobile applications, capacity building for cybercrime police station, using emerging tools to harness cyber crime investigation, dark web analysis, social media monitoring, cyber patrolling and formation of state-level immigration, visa and foreigners registration and tracking (IVFRT) system.

Besides, the meeting also deliberated on training police personnel in using DNA forensic applications during investigation, data analysis of calls made to police control rooms and developing a tourist tracking system.

In order to achieve fruitful results, deliberations were also held to fix a workable timeline, appointing nodal officers for each agenda item, best possible utilisation of resources, finalising deliverables and a robust review mechanism. It was also decided that a quarterly review mechanism shall be put in place to ensure that the project continues as per the plan.

The DGP also visited the research facilities at the IIT, Mandi, and interacted with the faculty and students about various projects undertaken by them.