Peshawar safe city project revived

CCTV cameras will be installed across the city

PESHAWAR:

Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) police and a private consultant firm on Wednesday signed a contract for the Peshawar Safe City Project which will be completed in five months.

Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) Inspector General of Police Moazzam Jah Ansari, Project Director Safe City Peshawar Waqar Ahmad, project consultant team and other high-ups attended the ceremony.

Project Director Waqar Ahmad and CEO Carbonate Pvt Jawad Ayub Baig signed the agreement.

It may be recalled that Safe City Project Peshawar is aimed at making the urban areas of Peshawar safe and secure through technology driven-efforts, including installation of CCTV cameras.

The main purpose of the project is to combat terrorism and other crimes particularly street crimes, car lifting and motorcycles theft through the best use of latest gadgets.

With the installation of high resolution CCTV cameras every point will come under the police surveillance and it will not be possible for law breakers to escape camera’s eye.

Around 915 points have been identified under this project.

Besides optical fiber cable on 1,000 kilometre, 25 LTE towers would be installed across the city. K-P Police integrated command control and communication centre C3 would be established at police station East Cantt.

Silent features of the mega project included surveillance, integrated emergency response, intelligent traffic management system (ITMS) and electronic evidence collection.

In the 1st phase, it will be started in Hayatabad as a pilot project which will be completed in a short span of five months.

While talking on the occasion, IGP Moazzam Jah Ansari said that safe city project will usher a new era of latest security apparatus in Peshawar.

The IGP said that the present government has taken several steps for enhancing the capability of the K-P police. He particularly praised the chief minister for his guidance to the K-P police, adding that the project was an ample proof in this regard.

The IGP assured full support and help for the timely completion of this project and hoped that it will prove a milestone in respect of modern security arrangements.

It may be mentioned here that the safe city project is at least one and a half decade old.

It was first successfully completed in Lahore and parts of Punjab under the Shehbaz Sharif government which greatly reduced the crime rate in those cities.

The K-P government also planned to implement it in Peshawar but in the past successive provincial governments failed to provide funds for the project despite repeated demand of the police.

Later it was implemented in Hayatabad only which invited great criticism because the rest of the city was not included in it.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 12^th, 2023.