LAHORE: The inspector general of police on Monday announced launch of new police surveillance system in four districts of the province.

The districts are Mianwali, Sialkot, Rahim Yar Khan and Bahawalnagar.

Holding a videoconferencing to discuss the matters regarding the police surveillance system IGP Arif Nawaz said it’s high time to employ the latest technology effectively.

He directed the police officers concerned to make the system functional by Sept 1. He assigned a task to the Safe City Authority managing director and the chief operating officer to cooperate with the regional police officers and the district police officers concerned to make the project functional at the earliest.

The meeting was told that under the scheme, CCTV cameras would be installed at 300 places of the four districts.

The IG said the surveillance system would improve monitoring of the sensitive areas and highways eventually helping the police face the major challenges and crimes, including terrorism. He said it would also help police arrest anti-social elements and curb street crime besides resolving traffic management.

He said the CCTV cameras, under an integrated system, would be installed on the routes and processions of Muharram besides on the venues of protests. He issued instructions not to assign unnecessary duties to the patrolling forces and other staff working under the surveillance system as first respondents in order to improve the response time in emergency situation.

DIG Headquarters Khurram Ali and RPOs of Gujranwala, Sargodha and Bahawalpur regions also attended the conference along with the DPOs.

Published in Dawn, July 23rd, 2019