Journalism of Courage
The next time you dial 100 for any kind of assistance from the city police,the response will be much better than before. Also,you will be liable for legal action under Section 149 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) if you resort to any mischief by making blank,abusive or irrelevant calls.
The control room of the city police has become more people-friendly with the installation of 10 telephone extension lines connected to a software provided by HCL Info System,which is expected to reduce the response time by two to three minutes. Also,the line will not remain busy for long.
Police personnel fluent in English and trained in soft skills have been posted in the control room on instructions of city police commissioner Meeran Borwankar. A special team of two has been given the task to nab those who make irrelevant calls or use abusive language.
Assistant Commissioner (control room) R A Shinde says the control room receives an average of 10,000 calls a day. As many as 3,06,693 calls were received between July 1 and 31,2011. The number of blank and irrelevant calls was also huge. There were 35,597 calls for inquiries alone.
The software records all calls. If anyone abuses the police or misuses the number,we send the details to our analytical wing,which traces the person. The caller will either booked under CrPC 149 or warned, Shinde says.
The police have,in July,issued notices to 229 persons under CrPC 149 besides warning 108 persons for making irrelevant calls. Shinde says a man was arrested for making a call in the guise of a police informer and naming a person with whom he had an enmity as a terror suspect.
The duty hours of the control room staff have also been reduced. Earlier,the control room staff worked for about 12 hours a day. We have cut their duty time to six hours a day. This is to ensure proper services to citizens, Shinde says.
The genuine calls are passed on directly to the patrolling staff at the respective police stations for immediate action. Earlier,our response time was seven to eight minutes. Now,it could be reduced to five to six minutes. We were also able to help accident victims in less time. Also,raids were conducted at illegal gambling dens, Shinde says.
The police plan to introduce SMS services to contact the control room from September.
