Modernising: City police thinks of installing GPS in vehicles

Installation in 17 Mujahid vehicles has improved performance.

LAHORE:

A committee headed by the Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) is looking into a Mujahid Squad proposal for installing global positioning system (GPS) devices in 250 more police vehicles.

The committee includes the SSP(Operations), SSP (Investigation), SP (Headquarters) and SP (Mujahid Squad). The CCPO would head the committee.

The proposal comes in the wake of installation of GPS devices in 17 Mujahid Squad vehicles. The devices keep the central command, at the Rescue Emergency 15 centre at Police Lines, updated on the location and speed of the vehicles.

SP Muntazir Mehdi said that crime fighting in the province would get a boost if all vehicles of the department were equipped with devices.

At present, he said, on taking charge of their duty everyday, police officials had to contact individual beat cars to find out about their locations.

With the GPS system, he said officials could find out the location of all cars in their area at the click of a computer mouse.

He said the system would keep the control room updated on whether any of the cars had moved out of the beat or if the officials were overstating the fuel expense.

Mehdi said the department was also pondering upon the option of getting microphones installed in the cars. This, he said, would let them record all conversations taking place in the cars.

Sources in the Mujahid Squad said the request was made after evaluating the performance of 17 GPS equipped vehicles. He said the officials driving these vehicles were found to have been more vigilant. He said these officials when asked to report at a crime scene could no longer get away by misreporting their location.

He said that with GPS devices in the vehicles, the officials would no longer be able to overstate fuel consumption figures. He said the policemen were suspected of making the fuel meter run by attaching a cog wheel device to it even when they were not using the cars. With the vehicles equipped with GPS devices, he said, the officials could no longer get away with biding time while they were supposed to be on patrol.

He said the GPS devices would enable the officials at the control centre to contact the nearest police cars in case of a crime. “They will also guide them about the most suitable routes,” he said.

It would cost the department between Rs30,000 and Rs40,000 to install the device in a car. The annual payment per car would be between Rs6,000 and Rs12,000.

Of the 250 cars proposed to carry the equipment, 100 are operated by Mujahid Squad, at least 80 by Operations Wing and the rest by Investigations Wing.



Published in The Express Tribune, April 17^th, 2011.