In the wake of increasing challenge of ensuring safety of Delhi residents, particularly women, the Delhi Police has decided to use mini drones fitted with night-vision cameras and thermal imaging cameras for aerial surveillance in the national Capital at night. The operation will be launched within a fortnight.
Although the first of its kind project was under active consideration of the Delhi Police for the last eight to ten weeks, the recent case of rape by an Uber driver seems to have warranted the early launch of the drone service for policing.
The Delhi Police has finalised the route map for the drones and all the technical issues involved in the launch have been sorted out. The Delhi Police has decided to patrol dark stretches, especially the areas considered crime prone.
“As a pilot project, it will be launched in the North district within a fortnight. North Delhi will become the first district with complete camera surveillance in Delhi once the project is launched. The only areas which will be kept out of surveillance will be the lG House, the Delhi Assembly and Metcalfe House,” said a senior police official.
The drones will fly at a height of approximately 200 metres above ground and will cover a hexagonal grid area of three to four kilometres. Technologically it will be ensured that the area covered by two drones does not overlap. “We can further enhance its capabilities by linking each drone to a Quick Response Team (QRT). The video can be streamed to a QRT vehicle, which will monitor it in real time and respond quickly if it sees something wrong,” he added. The North district has already carried out dry runs for the project by using drones to monitor immersions of Durga and Ganesha idols at Yamuna ghats in the area.
“Its suitability has been checked and we have got the sanction for the project from the police headquarters.
We are in the process of procuring the hardware and software component.
The drones will have night vision and thermal imaging cameras and its video and images can be used as evidence in case of a crime. It will also have anti-shaking software which will cancel any tremble in the video caused by the rotating blades of the flying machine and provide us steady picture. It will be capable to operate under all weather conditions. We will deploy three to four drones in the entire district and each one of them will cost around 10 lakh,” he said.
So far, the Delhi Police has used drones after taking it on rent from DRDO at around Rs50,000 per day. Using drones for patrolling will be of huge help for the police as it will not have to manually patrol the entire district which is hampered due to manpower crunch. “If we deploy a drone at all the entry routes of the district, we will be able to keep tabs of every vehicle entering the area. Once it’s successful in North Delhi, it can be implemented in other areas as well,” he said.