In a bid to secure its parking lots and keep a check on illegal parking, the North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NMC) has directed all contractors to install CCTV cameras in their parking lots within two weeks.
The decision comes in the wake of a recent meeting of the Special Task Force, wherein the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had asked the Municipal Corporations to install CCTV cameras in their parking lots and submit the compliance report at the earliest. “All contractors operating the parking sites within the jurisdiction of NMC are directed to install CCTV cameras with 30-day recording capacity and submit the compliance report within 15 days. In case of failure, strict action will be taken against the defaulting contractors,” said the order issued by the RP Cell of the North Delhi Corporation.
According to officials, the NMC has 119 parking lots. “All these contractors have been asked to install cameras for better monitoring. This will also help keep a check on malpractices by parking attendants,” said an official. According to them, CCTV surveillance in parking lots will enable them to keep a check on movement of all vehicles. This will serve a dual purpose — of thwarting any untoward incident and also checking any malpractice by parking attendants.
The NMC is also planning on making installation of sensors mandatory in parking areas, which will record entry and exit of vehicles that will ultimately help the civic body in maintaining a database of the vehicles using its facilities. “By installing sensors at parking lots, the NMC will be able to check the number of vehicles parked in a day at a particular parking site,” officials added.
It is noteworthy that the Delhi Police had asked the erstwhile unified MCD to equip its parking lots, especially those at popular markets, with CCTV cameras. The police had also asked the civic body to monitor the cameras either by a private operator or by itself. Sources in the Corporation said that due to trifurcation of MCD followed by the civic polls, the process of installing CCTV cameras was stalled.