The Centre has asked the Delhi Police to procure six unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to keep a round-the-clock vigil during US President Barack Obama’s visit and upcoming Assembly polls in the national Capital. Following the direction, the Delhi Police has sought permission from the Home Ministry to requisition six Netras — the lightweight UAV fitted with night vision high-resolution mini-cameras — from Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). The Delhi Police had earlier planned to procure only two drones (UAVs).
Top sources in the Delhi Police told The Pioneer: “An Israel-based company and another Mumbai-based company have made a presentation on drones. Finally, it has decided to buy Netra from DRDO,” said sources, adding that they want immediate approval of the project.
In a first of its kind project in the country, mini drones fitted with night vision cameras will be deployed for surveillance from the sky. The control room for drones will be set up at police headquarters. It will be operated by DRDO officials. The UAV, jointly developed by the DRDO and IdeaForge, a Mumbai-based private firm, had also appeared in the Aamir Khan-starrer 3 Idiots.
The cost of each Netra is expected to be between Rs1.5 lakh and Rs3 lakh. Flying at a speed of 40 kilometre per hour, the drones can be used for around 40-50 minutes, brought back to their base station, recharged, and then sent back on sorties several times during a day. Every drone will fly at a height of approximately 200 metres 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.
Netra was used by the Mumbai Police to keep vigil on idol immersions during Ganesh Chaturthi. Hovering a few hundred feet above the ground, it gave the police an aerial view of the crowd movement. With help from this eye in the sky, the event passed off smoothly. The device has already been used by security agencies like BSF, CRPF for counter-insurgency activities while NDRF used it to search for survivors during the Uttarakhand flash floods in 2012.
Recently, the Delhi Police used drones for surveillance over congested Trilokpuri after communal riots. The gadgets were deployed to monitor rooftops for bricks and empty bottles in the troubled area. The Delhi Police had taken it on rent from DRDO at Rs 50,000 per day. The drone helped in revealing a part of the anatomy of the riot — deadly weapons, ranging from cleavers to kirpan-type swords to heaps of bottles and knives of all sizes and sorts stacked on rooftops.
Delhi Government’s Forest Department has also planned to procure at least two drones to keep vigil. The Kerala Police is considering using drones for traffic and crowd surveillance at the popular temple in Sabarimala later this year. The Odisha Government is deploying them in its anti-Naxal operations.Using drones for patrolling will be of huge help for the Delhi Police, which is facing human resource crunch.