An Integrated Command Control Centre at the SP office in Vellore has commenced its operations on Thursday to monitor movement of vehicles and people in the town including border areas. Officials said that initially, the centre was temporarily functioning from the Vellore Corporation’s headquarters for the past few months to allow the SP office to have necessary infrastructure facilities to run the centre. As a first step, the centre at the SP office will monitor idol immersion procession from Friday. Subsequently, traffic violations, crime and other offences will be covered. “The centre, which is yet to be completely functional in a full-fledged way, will help in better coordination between the headquarters and field operatives, especially during the festival season. So, we decided to run the centre with the available infrastructure,” S. Rajesh Kannan, Superintendent of Police (Vellore), told The Hindu. At present, the Vellore Corporation has around 500 CCTV cameras installed under the Smart Cities Mission programme to monitor various infrastructure works and civic amenities. Alongside, the district police has 270 cameras under the Self Sufficient Scheme (SSS). Individuals, non-profit organisations and traders also have 200 cameras. Of total 970 cameras, the centre will initially monitor visuals from 318 cameras, mainly in Vellore’s Old Town. Besides, the centre will also monitor footage from Automatic Number-Plate Recognition (ANPR) cameras. These cameras were installed at the five border check-posts in the district to monitor movement of vehicles and to prevent illegal sand mining. At present, check posts are located at Christianpet, Mutharasi Kuppam, Pathirappally, Sainagunta, and Paratharami. These cameras will not only capture images of vehicles and number plates but would also provide live feed to the centre. Each ANPR camera has 15 days of storage capacity with two cameras in each check post.
