ISLAMABAD: Conceived in 2008, the Islamabad Safe City project is finally becoming a reality, as the final camera of its pilot project was installed in the capital on Thursday.

But new controversies have developed among the three operators of the project.

The fourth and last camera of the pilot project was installed at Aabpara Chowk. Three more cameras have already been installed at Zero Point, outside Nadra head office and also at the Aabpara chowk towards Lal Masjid.

A temporary command and control centre under the pilot project has also been set up at the NTC building to check the technical working of the cameras and their practical support for the police.

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The Islamabad Safe City project is being implemented and will be managed by Nadra while the police will monitor the cameras. The CDA provides support in land-related issues.

Under the multi-billion rupees project, 2,200 security cameras will be installed in capital

However, all the three parties are at loggerheads with each other over different issues.

The police have two complaints each against the two executing agencies of the project.

The police complaint against the CDA is about the location of the command and control centre.

“The place is at H-11 sector which might be a serious trouble spot in future as it is located near the new site of Jamia Hafsa,” an official of the Special Branch told Dawn.

The plot of around 22 kanals has been transferred to Nadra through the interior ministry for establishing the command and control centre from where 2,200 cameras to be installed all over the capital would be monitored.

The monitoring would be carried out by the operation police while the traffic police will trace the movement of any lawbreaker.

On the other hand, the CDA maintains that the plot belonged to the interior ministry and had been handed over to the agency.

“It was a 40-kanal plot for a training institute for firefighters. Half of the plot was used for the training centre and the remaining portion has been handed over to the ministry for the safe city project,” said an official of the CDA planning wing.

The other reservation of the police is that Nadra did not include any officer from their department in the execution of the pilot project.

“There is no involvement of the operation police or traffic police in selecting the site to install the cameras or even monitoring the results,” said an officer in the operation department of the police.

Similarly, the CDA and Nadra are at loggerhead over the compensation issue and the focal person of the civic body in the project. The director general administration, CDA, Sohail Durrani, has even threatened Nadra that it would be stopped from laying cables for the project.

When contacted, Mr Durrani declined to comment, saying it was an issue of national security.

However, sources in the department said Nadra had misstated their work.

“Nadra applied for permission to lay a single cable line on around 83 kilometres and, in return, the civic agency asked for Rs21.8 million which Nadra paid to it,” the sources said.

“But Nadra is now laying a double-duct line for which it should pay an additional amount of Rs10 million.”

The multi-billion rupee project has seen many ups and downs since it was initiated six years ago and even the Supreme Court terminated the contract in 2010. Later, however, it was pushed by the incumbent government and the contract was awarded to the same Chinese company as the loaning agency - Exim Bank of China - had tied the funds with the award of the contract.

Published in Dawn, November 14th, 2014