Siliguri, 01st February: In the year 2020, after an incident in Punjab, the Supreme Court issued a new directory. Under which, it was made mandatory to install CCTV cameras in every police station in the country from the prisoner room to the room of IC and OC. Along with this, recording will have to be kept for at least 7 days in each police station.
Following this Supreme Court directive, in the year 2021, the West Bengal government also made it compulsory to install CCTV cameras in every police station. Under this guideline, the installation of cameras started in each police station of Darjeeling and Kalimpong along with Siliguri Metropolitan Police.
The state government has now taken another step by taking the directions of the Supreme Court seriously. Under which the state government has given the responsibility of data storage and maintenance of CCTV of the police station to a non-governmental organization.
Jalpaiguri Divisional Commissioner A. R. Bardhan held a meeting with the Commissioner of Siliguri Metropolitan Police, Superintendent of Police of Darjeeling and Kalimpong in Uttar Kanya today regarding this issue. He said that on the directions of the Supreme Court, the work of installing CCTV cameras in IC, OC and lockup rooms of every police station across the state has been completed. However, the cameras that have been installed are not state-of-the-art. Therefore, the work of installing high-quality CCTV cameras in Siliguri, Darjeeling and Kalimpong will start soon.
Furthermore, the CCTV camera runs on WiFi. As a result, sometimes the CCTV camera gets switched off without the knowledge of the cops. In view of this, preparations are on to hand over the responsibility to an NGO in Uttar Kanya. After the office is opened, the personnel of the organization can keep the CCTV and data of each police station safe.