Bidhannagar police have tracked down three of the accused in the gang rape of a 26-year-old woman with the help of footage from CCTV cameras installed across Sector V, underscoring the importance of tech tools in modern-day policing.
The stretch of road from where the woman had been allegedly abducted in a white vehicle and gang raped by four men is lined with office and commercial buildings that have surveillance cameras at the entry and exit points.
Footage from cameras in buildings along EP and GP blocks of Sector V, including the area where the RDB Boulevard commercial complex and the Shimmers nightclub at Sugam Business Park are located, proved crucial in identifying the accused.
According to a senior police officer of the Bidhannagar commissionerate, the footage revealed that the woman had "boarded" a white Tata Sumo at 12.30am.
"We examined the footage culled from several CCTV cameras near the site where the woman said she was pushed inside a car. We found out that she was taken in a Tata Sumo from in front of the Shimmers nightclub, near RDB Boulevard," the officer said.
The traumatised woman, who is apparently new to the city and lives in the Baguiati neighbourhood along VIP Road, hadn't been able to tell investigators the make of the car in which she was allegedly raped. She also couldn't recall if the car was a hatchback, a sedan or an MUV. Police sources had initially said that the vehicle used by the accused was a white sedan.
The camera footage revealed that the Sumo travelled towards the Sector V ring road, barely 50 metres from the spot where the woman had been allegedly abducted.
Based on a basic reconstruction of the car's route, investigators had approached possible witnesses along the route for additional details. The statements of owners, employees and customers of eateries that remain open in the area through the night apparently helped the cops corroborate what the CCTV footage suggested.
Police sources said one witness gave the investigators the last four digits of the car's registration number, which helped them figure out that it was a pool car.
Some of the surveillance cameras along the route haven't been working properly, but the available footage was enough to crack at least this case.
Sector V has 13 CCTV cameras installed by the Nabadiganta Industrial Township Authority, the administrative body of the tech hub. These cameras are at the Wipro and Webel crossings, Technopolis and College More, among other locations.
The smaller roads and lanes of Sector V don't have any cameras, though. The road in front of RDB Boulevard is one stretch that is dependent on surveillance through the buildings located there.
The police had held several meetings with companies that have offices in the area to get them to set up all-weather, night vision-capable CCTV cameras that would not only log the entry and exit of their employees and visitors but also record footage of incidents happening outside the buildings.
This move could prove to be the game changer in the fight against crime in that part of the city, going by how CCTV footage helped the police catch three of the accused in the gang rape incident.
"It is not always possible for a patrol team to be near the scene of crime. But CCTV cameras can help us identify the culprits. Even a board that proclaims that an area is under CCTV surveillance could be a deterrent to crime. We have repeatedly asked all building owners in Salt Lake and Sector V to install such cameras as they help in solving crimes," said an additional deputy commissioner of police in the Bidhannagar commissionerate.
Cameras are even more important when a police force doesn't have the manpower to maintain manual surveillance of an entire township at night. Around 1,600 personnel are required to police 148sq km under the jurisdiction of the Bidhannagar commissionerate.
