Pimpri Chinchwad police will expand the use of drones, body-worn cameras, CCTV, an Integrated Traffic Management System and artificial intelligence to strengthen crime prevention and detection in the rapidly growing industrial city, Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis said at a police infrastructure event.
The state government has provided the commissionerate with 65 new vehicles, four drones and 350 body-worn cameras. Fadnavis also handed over the 7/12 land extract for a 50-acre plot at Tathawade to the police department and laid the foundation stone for construction of the Pimpri police commissionerate.
The chief minister said Pimpri Chinchwad could have a larger population than Pune over the next 15 years, underlining the administrative and law-and-order pressures created by the township’s expansion. The city is a major industrial and employment centre, and its police commissionerate is also dealing with changing patterns of crime, according to police commissioner Vinoy Kumar Choubey.
Fadnavis said Maharashtra Police had emerged as the country’s best-performing force in emergency response, while Pimpri Chinchwad police ranked first in the state on this measure. He said the Dial 112 emergency response system had reduced police response time to three minutes.
The chief minister urged the police to adopt technological solutions for policing and said work was under way to develop artificial intelligence as an assistant for the police machinery. He added that investigations into all crimes would become entirely AI-based in the coming years. The statement did not specify a timeline, operating framework or safeguards for such a system.
An independent CCTV network and the Integrated Traffic Management System were launched as part of the projects inaugurated for the commissionerate. The new systems are expected to support traffic management and policing operations, although the information available does not detail the number of cameras, locations covered, procurement cost or implementation schedule.
Fadnavis also called for coordinated action against substance abuse. He said the government was working through awareness programmes, treatment and rehabilitation of addicts, measures to curb drug production and action against distribution networks. He urged citizens, parents and institutions to participate in a campaign aimed at making the country drug-free within the next three to four years.
The police commissionerate has expanded its organisational structure alongside the city’s growth. It now has two additional commissioners of police, while the number of deputy commissioners has increased from three to nine and assistant commissioners from eight to 18. The number of police stations has risen from 17 to 25, including an independent cyber police station.
A separate zone has also been created to secure the industrial area. Choubey said the rising population and changing nature of crime had increased the challenges of maintaining law and order in Pimpri Chinchwad.
Fadnavis inaugurated the office of the deputy commissioner of police for Zone IV during the event. Police personnel also contributed one day’s salary towards drought relief, raising Rs 1 crore for the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund.
