After perpetrators of several railway crimes could not be nabbed owing to pooru00a0quality of surveillance footage, authorities are refurbishing security systems

The Mumbai railway commute just got safer. With the disagreement between the railway authorities and the Government Railway Police (GRP) regarding railway security coming to an end, brand new CCTV cameras will be installed at Western Railway (WR) stations very soon. These state-of-the-art equipment will provide greater clarity, and can store footage for almost a month. The agency, which has been roped in, has promised to maintain these cameras well and provide better services. Owing to the advanced technology used in these cameras, better quality footage can be used as evidence to nab criminals who are caught on tape.


Out of focus: The CCTV cameras installed across the suburban railway
network in the city will be replaced soon, as most of them do not work
properly. Some are unable to capture the images clearly (inset). File pic

"The CCTV cameras installed across the suburban railway network in the city are of poor quality. In fact, most of them are useless. They don't cover a wide area, and fail to function most of the time. Moreover, the footage which is recorded is more often than not very unclear," said GRP commissioner Tukaram Chavan at a press conference. The 26/11 attacks have long ago exposed the truth of the dysfunctional CCTV cameras at CST. But more recent events have exposed the deplorable condition of the security equipment at stations across the city. The railway authorities sat up and took notice of the sorry state of surveillance equipment after the recent discovery of a dead body at Virar station.

According to GRP officials, the major hurdle faced during the probe was the fact that the CCTV cameras had not captured any useful footage of the incident. "The camera couldn't capture images of the criminal loading the body onto the vendor's compartment. This was because the compartment was located beyond the camera's range," said a GRP inspector. Again, on April 30, Nanki Lal Mohammed Siddique (65), hailing from Uttar Pradesh, was discovered by her grandson Mohammed Imran Siddique (20), with her throat slit, in the ladies' compartment of Kamayani Express, at Kurla. The police found a faint image of a suspect from the CCTV footage taken at Thane station, where he had boarded the Kamayani Express. But owing to the poor quality of footage, his identity could not be confirmed. All that the police could make out was that the suspect was wearing a black T-shirt.

The Bandra Railway Police force has three stations and the Bandra Terminus under its jurisdiction. 22 CCTV cameras at the stations are not operational. The Bandra Terminus has 48 cameras, of which only 30 are in working order. Some of the cameras cannot rotate, and have a limited capacity to capture footage. Sharat Chandrayan, Chief PRO, Western Railway, said, "Earlier, the cameras could only store data for the short period of about a week. But these new cameras can store data for a longer period. The control of these cameras will be centralised. Moreover, these cameras are more powerful."

Upgraded security
Following the 26/11 terror attacks and the 11/7 serial blasts on WR trains, the Ministry of Railways planned to integrate its security system packages. The authorities at Central Railway (CR) are also in the process of updating their railway stations with hi-tech security equipment, which include night-vision cameras, internet-based security surveillance, vapour detectors and bomb baskets.These gadgets collectively come with a price tag of Rs 27.49 crore. The WR package will cost a comparatively lower Rs 14.7 crore, which will include gadgets, vehicle scanners, X-ray machines and portable devices.
u00a0
468 The number of CCTV cameras u00a0the WR has at all its railway stations, 354 of which are u00a0fixed and 114 movable

950 Number of CCTV cameras u00a0the CR has at its railway u00a0stations, of which 100u00a0 have been installed at CST