Earlier this month, police in Tseminyu town were able to arrest a burglar who stole some items from a shop worth around Rs.1,00,000 with the help of CCTV footage. Police there claimed that the accused was arrested within 24 hours and the stolen items recovered ‘solely on the basis of CCTV footage’. Police there installed CCTVs at strategic locations in and around the town for better surveillance keeping public safety as priority. The CCTVs were installed with the support of the Traders Union Tseminyu Town. Now, there are three lessons or more than can be drawn from this. First, public safety and security is the primary responsibility of the police as demonstrated by Tseminyu Police. Second, certain effective measures can be undertaken even without adequate funding from the government if the authorities are proactive and have the zeal and willpower. Third, CCTVs are effective tools for crime deterrence and prevention. Of course, CCTVs are costly and there are also issues of privacy violation through surveillance cameras. However, with a little proactive approach and cooperation of the community, like in Tseminyu, there surely must be a way to procure a few CCTVs. Further, under the IT Act, privacy rights are adequately covered and violators will be befittingly punished.
The case in point here is the recent videos of violence that went viral on social media. Most of us have seen it, not one but two. Those may be isolated incidents or could be only two of many incidents caught on tape. Incidents like that are not complementary to public safety and security. If there were CCTV surveillance, incidents like those ‘street fights’ can be deterred. Apart from violence, other forms of crime like theft, extortion and burglary as well as accidents can be more effectively deterred and monitored. This is not to suggest that Mokokchung Police was caught off guard but that technological interventions, like installation of CCTVs, can deter and prevent crimes to a good extent and that, with proactive leadership, the authorities and the community can somehow manage to carry it out even without government funding. When it comes to crime deterrence, the certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than the punishment.