In bid to reduce corruption, Chandigarh traffic cops’ duties to be assigned through software

The traffic police have prepared a randomisation software free from human interference. The software automatically picks the names of the personnel for duty assignments, making sure that everyone gets 24-hour rest once in a week.

The development came about as the department had been receiving repeated complaints and inputs regarding duty assignments being given to specific persons at specific locations, hinting at corruption in assigning of duties.

Officials said that the system will ensure that field duty is assigned to every traffic police personnel.

The software will also decide the weekly offs of every personnel. The personnel will not be able to influence or alter the off days as per their choice. The duties at over-speeding check nakas and drunken driving nakas will be given on rotational basis.

SSP (traffic/security) Manoj Kumar Meena tweeted about the software and said that it aims to reduce favouritism and corruption.

SP (traffic) Ketan Bansal said, “The duty roster has been released. From Thursday, traffic police personnel will be assigned duty points as per the roster. Generally, we expect 12-hour duty from each traffic police personnel. The duty roster will contain details of the duty from 8 am to 8 pm. The software will regulate the duty assignments to upto sub inspector (SI) rank and constable rank. Apart from the field duty staff personnel, duties of personnel engaged in the administrative work will also be regulated through the software.”

The development comes in the background of a recently constituted Police Reform Commission under the supervision of a retired IPS officer. The commission is yet to submit its report in the office of DGP Sanjay Baniwal. UT Administrator VP Singh Badnore recently instructed the UT police to implement the recommendations of the reform commission as soon as possible.

Sources said if the trial is successful, the software will also be used for other wings, including security, PCR and communication, among others .

Traffic police personnel, particularly those assigned field duty, are directed to focus on challaning maximum number of vehicles. There have been instances when hundreds of traffic personnel were served show cause notices for not meeting the fixed target of issuing traffic violation challans manually.