PATNA: Bihar CM Nitish Kumar on Wednesday launched ‘dial 122’ and inaugurated the command and control centre of the emergency response support system (ERSS) on the campus of Bihar Police Radio in the state capital here.
Besides these, the CM also flagged off around 400 Emergency Response Vehicles equipped with mobile data terminals for all 38 districts in the state. These vehicles would be stationed at all the fixed places in Patna district and the district headquarters and other strategic locations in other districts. One police officer and three to four armed constables would be regularly on duty in each emergency response vehicle.
The CM was informed that an amount of Rs 176 crore has been spent on the implementation of the first phase of the scheme. All areas of other districts (except Patna) would be covered in the second phase of the scheme.
Nitish told the home (police) department officials to make immediate arrangements of the required number of emergency response vehicles and manpower for the second phase of the scheme. “Besides the emergency response vehicles, 500 motorcycles should be added in the scheme to improve the work efficiency,” Nitish said.
After the inauguration, the CM took stock of the entire system. He sat in the control room and inquired about the entire system, how emergency calls would be received, how they would be monitored, and action taken on the emergency calls made by the people in distress.
The CM further disclosed that earlier the police headquarters had proposed to depute only two armed constables in the emergency response vehicle. “I had then advised officers to depute at least three to four armed constables. Now, I am happy that three to four armed constables are being deputed in each emergency response vehicle,” he said.
Expressing happiness over deputation of only women employees at the control centre of ‘dial 112’, Nitish said it has added a new chapter in the area of women empowerment in Bihar.
The CM was informed that altogether 90 policewomen would be deputed at the Patna-based centralised command and control centre in each shift only to receive calls on emergency no 112. “Other 24 women police officers would work in each shift for taking further actions on the call received. While other two officers would be deputed for overall supervision of the call centre in each shift. There would be three shifts- one shift of 8 hours – in a day,” a senior police officer who was briefing the CM on the functioning of the call centre of emergency no-112, told the CM.
