AI cameras helped arrest road traffic violations, crimes in Kerala, says Minister Antony Raju

After reviewing the performance of the AI-enabled fully-automated traffic enforcement system, which was made operational in June this year, Transport Minister Antony Raju on Tuesday said traffic violations have come down during these four months compared to corresponding months last year.

“In April this year, when the project was launched on a trial basis, an average of 4.50 lakh traffic violations in a day had been detected in the state by the IA-enabled camera network. But last month, the daily average of violations detected has come down to 44,600, despite the growth in vehicular traffic and number of vehicles registered in the state,” he pointed out.

The minister said that as against 1,329 accident deaths were reported in the four months from June in 2022, only 1,007 deaths were reported in the corresponding period this year. “Since many critically injured persons would be in hospitals, the exact figures pertaining to death would not reflect in the early data,” he added.

Minister Raju also quoted the data from major government hospitals in the state to substantiate the decline in the number of road accidents.

“In June 2022, 13,219 road accident cases had been reported at leading government hospitals in Kerala, whereas in the same month of 2023, the figure was 12,421. The figure for 2022 July was 6,608 and it slightly came down to 6088 in July 2023, he elucidated.

Since the launch of the enforcement project, challans (for penalty) worth Rs 102 crore have been generated. However, so far only Rs 14 crore could be levied from the violators till October 8. As per the data of September, Members of Parliament and legislators have been caught for violations 56 times.

As many as 726 incident detection Artificial Intelligence-enabled cameras have been erected along the highways and major roads in the state. Of the 726 cameras installed on highways, 675 of them are meant to detect riding without a helmet, without a seat belt and hit-and-run cases. Another set of cameras was meant to detect illegal parking, over-speeding and other violations.

The cameras dispatch the violations to 14 district-level control rooms as well as a state-level control room run by the Motor Vehicles Department. The Motor Vehicles Department would serve notices to vehicle owners based on the offences detected by these cameras. Vehicle owners/riders have to pay a fixed penalty, with the sum depending upon the offence.

When the project was launched, the Opposition Congress had alleged corruption and moved a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in the Kerala High Court in this regard.

Last week, quoting certain reports, Opposition Leader V D Satheesan alleged that the state government was engaged in a false campaign that accidents had come down after the incident detection cameras were installed, so as to cover up the corruption.