‘Policing’ on cloud

Technology is fast becoming a major tool to bring transparency in the working of several government departments. There have been several instances wherein the police have been accused of not being transparent while investigating a case, but now with the help of technology they are ensuring that their credibility is not doubted. In order to bring in more transparency, the state Crime Investigation Department (CID)- crime branch, has started a new initiative, one which not only strengthens the police’s conduct and transparency but will also put those people giving statements under scanner.

For the past three months, the CID - CB has taken to video recording of statements of witnesses, accused and parties regarding different cases. In just three months since its inception, the CID officers have recorded a whopping 685 statements related to various cases being investigated by the branch.

Highly placed officials said, “There have been instances wherein the investigating officers have been accused of tampering with statements of people. We record the statements under section 161 CrPC, but in court, a person can turn them down and claim that the cops tampered with it, thus affecting not only the case but even police’s credibility.”

To uphold the state police’s integrity, the CID started video recording of cases. “We came up with the idea and took it ahead. Now all the cases being investigated in the CID are covered in this fashion. We provided smart phones to our officers and taught them how to record the statements on video. The video is so recorded that not just the person giving statements is seen but even the IO so that there is no allegation put on us later that a person gave a certain statement under pressure” said Pankaj Kumar Singh, Additional Director General - Crime.

But what happens of the video after the statements are recorded? “As a person finishes his/her statements, immediately the video gets uploaded on the cloud. The service is provided by DoIT who provide security and other facilities for our data as well. No tampering of such a video is possible either at our end or at the other person’s end. Thus it is secure. Moreover, there is an additional feature. As soon as the video is uploaded to cloud, the concerned Superintendent (SP) and the Inspector General (IG) receive a text message which contains details of the case for which the video is uploaded and the name of person whose statements have been recorded amongst other details” the ASG informed.

No statement changing

And what happens when the case goes for trial? “When we file a chargesheet, we will mention that statements are available in video also. If any person changes statements in court, we can anytime produce those videos before the court to corroborate with our reports thus proving that the person was lying in court and not the police. Electronically recorded statements are admissible in court,” Pankaj Kumar Singh said.

Contemplating to use it state-wide

Interestingly, the department hopes that the newly adopted method would be implemented across the state. “We are studying the development and hoping this would be adopted in investigations in police station level, but we don’t see that happening before December. It will be taken slowly as first only a certain area of the state and certain crimes for example women related crimes would be covered. Then we would move to SC/ST crimes and so on,” an officials said.