Seventy-six railway stations under South Central Railways (SCR), including MMTS suburban stations, will soon be equipped with Artificial Intelligence (AI) enabled Video Analytics Software and Facial Recognition Software to help “detect known criminals triggering an alert when they enter station premises”.
These are among the 756 stations chosen across the country for implementation of Video Surveillance System (VSS) project (CCTV cameras network) under Nirbhaya Fund at railway stations by Rail Tel, it was announced on Wednesday.
First phase by Jan. 2023
The first phase is likely to be completed by January 2023. This project will ensure there are CCTVs in waiting halls, reservation counters, parking areas, main entrance or exit, platforms, foot over bridges, and booking offices, said senior officials.
These are being networked on optical fibre cable and the video feed of the CCTVs will be displayed not only at local RPF posts but also at a centralised CCTV control room, at divisional and zonal level. The video feeds will be monitored at three levels to ensure enhanced safety and security at railway premises.
A Network Management System (NMS) has also been provided for monitoring of cameras, server, UPS and switches, which can be viewed from any web browser by authorised personnel.
Four types of IP cameras (dome, bullet, pan tilt zoom type and ultra HD- 4k) are being installed to ensure maximum coverage and the video feeds will be stored for 30 days or longer for important feeds. An alarm will go off whenever there is any intrusion detection, camera tampering, loitering detection, human and vehicle detection, or search of humans based on attribute.
Panic buttons
Two panic buttons will also be installed at each platform in the chosen stations. Once activated by any person in distress, an alarm shall appear on the screens along with the pop-up of the associated camera on the operator workstation. A centralised and integrated dashboard view will be available for dealing with the system, said chief PRO Ch. Rakesh.
The VSS project will be installed in the following stations in Telangana and 35 others in Andhra Pradesh: Osmania University Arts College, Dabeerpura, Falaknuma, Uppuguda, Jamia Osmania, Malakpet, Sitaphalmandi, Vidyanagar, Yakutpura, Bharathnagar, Borabanda, Chandanagar, Fatehnagar Bridge, Hafeezpet, Hi-Tec City, James Street, Khairatabad, Lakdi-ka-pul, Nature Cure Hospital, Necklace Road, Sanjeevaiah Park, Warangal, Begumpet, Bhadrachalam Road, Kazipet, Khammam, Lingampalli, Mahabubabad, Mancherial, Ramagundam, Sirpur Kagaznagar, Tandur, Vikarabad, Parli Vaijnath, Kacheguda and Kamareddy.
