Special police teams use hi-tech to enforce quarantine

Five SP-level officers deployed as officers on special duty to coordinate activities in five districts

Police checking vehicles at Thevara in Kochi on Tuesday.

The State police have been pulling out all stops to keep track of all in-bound international travellers to Kerala since early March and to also strictly enforce quarantine norms using technology, in a bid to contain the spread of COVID-19.

The Malabar area is sharply in focus for the drive launched on Monday night in view of the extent of travel undertaken by a Kasaragod resident who defied home quarantine following his arrival from Dubai and tested positive for the virus later.

Five Superintendent-level officers have been deployed as officers on special duty to coordinate the pandemic-related activities in five districts – Kasaragod, Kannur, Malappuram, Kollam rural, and Thiruvananthapuram rural. This apart, a special four-member team led by Inspector General of Police Vijay Sakhare has been deployed exclusively for Kasaragod, considering the fluid condition there.

There have been 1.3 lakh overseas returnees to the State since March 1, but the special teams would be focusing on returnees from countries categorised as at a high-risk for COVID-19.

The passenger list accessed by the teams from the anti-terrorism squad (ATS) of the State police shows that over 25,000 in-bound passengers during this period were from Malappuram followed by Kozhikode (15,000), Kannur (6,400) and Kasaragod (just over 2,000).

“The goal is to keep tabs on passengers from high-risk countries and to check quarantine violations,” K. Sethuraman, DIG, who who is coordinating COVID-19 containment activities for the police in Kozhikode and Wayanad districts.

Ashok Yadav, IGP, is coordinating the activities in Kannur.

Manoj Abraham, ADGP, Headquarters, said that the primary focus was on high risk countries as listed out by the Central government guidelines and included countries such as Italy and Iran. “However, this list keeps on changing as per the threat perception. Besides, the list of people can also be sourced from the medical screening conducted at airports,” he said.

The tracking down is mainly done with the help of three basic technologies, including verifying mobile tower location. The location history of these people could also be sourced from Google, which has agreed to it considering the present situation.

Geo-fencing technology, a location-based service to trigger a pre-programmed boundary so as to track breaches, is also being used for the purpose.