Context :
SC:
CCTVs must in offices of CBI, ED, Police Stations / HT –
03 Dec
Extract :
With the aim of
preventing custodial torture, the Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered for
installation of CCTV cameras in the offices of the Central Bureau of
Investigation (CBI), Enforcement Directorate (ED), the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and other agencies, in addition to police stations across the country.
Extending the ambit of its 2018 order, the top court maintained that not
only police stations but all the other agencies, which have the power to make
arrests and interrogate, must also have CCTVs and recording devices installed in their premises. Therefore, the bench headed by
Justice Rohinton F Nariman directed the central government to get CCTV cameras with audio-recording facility installed in the offices of CBI, ED, NIA, Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB),
Department of Revenue Intelligence (DRI),
Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO)
and all such agencies.
“As most of
these agencies carry out interrogation in their office(s), CCTVs shall be
compulsorily installed in all offices where such interrogation and holding of
accused takes place in the same manner as it would in a police station,”
directed the bench.
In 2018, the
court had passed a judgment for bringing all police stations under the
surveillance of the CCTV cameras to check human rights abuses. For this purpose, all states were required to constitute independent committees that
could study CCTV camera footages and periodically publish reports of its
observations.
Further, this judgment asked the Central government to a set up a Central
Oversight Body (COB) and provide necessary funds…
Two years on, when the bench sought to evaluate the progress made
by the states, it noted severe deficiencies in complying with its judgment across
the board.
Besides, the court order made SHO of each police station
responsible for upkeep and maintenance of CCTV cameras.
The cameras need to be installed at all entry and
exit points, main gate of the police station, all lock-ups, reception area, officials’
rooms, and station hall.
It added that a State Level Oversight Committee,…must also
be constituted to make certain the court’s directions are duly complied with…
Similarly, District Level Oversight Committees,…will be set
up in all districts to interact with the SHOs for upkeep of CCTVs and review the footage for any human
right violation.
The Centre and states have been given six weeks by the
court to file their compliance affidavit with details of cameras installed,
exact timeline of completing the remaining installations and constitution of
oversight committees.
===================================================
Context :
Bombay
HC bats for CCTV cameras in police stations, directs cops to maintain daily
register / 06 Dec
Extract :
..Aurangabad bench of the Bombay High Court, ..went a step ahead
and directed police stations in the state to maintain a register detailing
the daily functioning of the said CCTV cameras to
prevent custodial torture.
.. the bench remarked, “This is not the first instance when the
concerned police station has informed that CCTV system was not working. Some
specific directions are given by this court at this seat and at the principal
seat also to see that CCTV systems are installed in every police station and it
should cover lockup and other portions of police stations.”
“Such system controls
activities like atrocities
against persons who are brought to police station. It is surprising that in
many cases submission is made that on that particular day, the CCTV system was
not working… This cannot be allowed to happen as the purpose
behind installing the CCTV system itself is defeated when
such submissions are accepted.”
“This court wants to see
that the registers are maintained in respect of the CCTV
system in the concerned police station to ascertain the truthfulness
of the submission that CCTV system was not working on that day,”
===================================================
MY TAKE :
Ø This
, seemingly harsh order, was perhaps inevitable given the instances of Police
brutalities over the decades ( may be a legacy of the British Raj )
Ø Although
not a perfect solution ( to elimination of violations of human rights ), this
will help
Ø It
is not possible to satisfactorily answer ( right now, at least ), following
questions raised by Economic Times Editorial ( 04 Dec ) – but one must thank ET for raising the
same :
# Is
( this surveillance ) sufficient to eliminate torture ?
# what is to prevent the police from arranging interrogation rooms outside
police stations, where to carry
# What is the guarantee tat CCTV cameras will not suffer convenient
outages or that
the recordings would
pouring from a leaky roof ?
# Is electronic surveillance the optimal utilization, from the point of view
of advancing the cause of
required to install cameras in every room and corridor of every police
station in the country ?
# Do we have the bandwidth to back-up the videography recording in the
cloud ?
Ø To these , I would like to add the following questions :
# Is it possible for those members of the District Level Oversight
Committees ( humans
after all,
the footage for any human right violation ?
Consider the
following facts :
# We have a total of some 16,671 police stations spread among 718
districts ( ave of 23 / district )
# Each police station may need 20 CCTV cameras , ie., 460 cameras per
district (
23 x 20 )
# Recording for say 12 hours / day, amounts to a CCTV footage of 5520
hours / day, to be reviewed
human rights violation “
# From a video / audio, how does a human detect / conclude a “ human
rights violation “ ?
- which are
“ In terms of Section 2 of the Protection of
Human Rights Act, 1993 (hereafter referred to as 'the Act'), "human
rights" means the rights relating to life, liberty, equality and dignity of the individual guaranteed under the Constitution or
embodied in the International Covenants and enforceable by courts in India.
{
source : https://nhrc.nic.in/frequently-asked-questions
}
If there
are 5 members in district committee and each member is ( say ) able to spare
one hour per day to review CCTV footage , that would amount to a reviewing a mere 5 hours of recording , out of 5520 hours !
No
chance of catching any
instance of “ human rights violation “ !
And here is
a larger question :
“ What
spoken words / facial expressions ( captured and reviewed by committee members
), are clear / indisputable proof of violation of life , liberty, equality,
dignity ? “
Would all 5
members of the committee agree unanimously that the ( video captured ) facial expression of person
being interrogated, displays unmistakable signs of emotions like FRUSTRATION, FEAR ,
PAIN etc ? What if there is disagreement ?
Altogether
there can be 3590 committee member ( 718 districts x 5 persons )
Can all of
them consistently and identically “ decipher human emotions “ ( our clue to violations ) ?
I cannot
escape a feeling that “ review “ by humans, will only lead to “ my word against your word “ situation !
Is there a NON-HUMAN
, technology based method to accurately /
consistently / untiringly , decipher those human
emotions and conclusively establish that,
Ø Person being interrogated, definitely
displayed emotions of FRUSTRATION - FEAR – PAIN - ANGUISH ?
Ø Police officer interrogating, displayed
emotions of ANGER – CONTEMPT – THREAT – HATE – MALICE
?
I urge the Supreme Court to consider,
Ø Integration with those lakhs of CCTV cameras ,
a ( human independent
) technology-based software which can detect
in a VIDEO-RECORDING, the “ human emotions “ listed
above and then alert ( by automatically e-mailing that
offensive portion of a VIDEO-CLIP ) to Human Rights Commission / District
– State level Oversight Committees Members / any other designated persons or
agencies , along with full details of :
# District / Police Station Number
# Name – Rank of interrogating Police Officer
# Name
/ Aadhar ID of suspect being interrogated
# Date / Time of interrogation
# Suspected Offence for which being
interrogated
# FIR No
In case
such a Technology Platform is NOT available from any Indian company, then the
Supreme Court may consider the following provider :
===================================================
Ø https://www.affectiva.com/how/how-it-works/
“
Human Perception AI.
Our software detects all things human: nuanced emotions, complex cognitive states,
behaviors, activities, interactions and objects people use.
Built on deep learning, computer vision, speech science and massive amounts of real-world data, Affectiva’s technology can detect nuanced human emotions, complex cognitive states, activities, interactions and objects people use.
https://ranaelkaliouby.com/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rana_el_Kaliouby
===================================================
Ø CORTICA
This autonomous AI is embedded in next-generation,
ultra-scale platforms where understanding
images is a critical task
Cortica, an Israeli company with deep roots
in security and AI research, recently formed a partnership in India with Best Group to analyse the terabytes of data streaming from CCTV
cameras in public areas.
The
companies' combined efforts will provide an array of solutions for combing through the staggering
amount of data captured daily through millions of hours of footage shot by
drones, surveillance cameras and satellites.
The sheer breath
of data surveilled on a given day renders manual examination nearly impossible.
Autonomous
AI enables real-time identification of patterns, concepts and situational
anomalies to identify potential problems, flag them and
improve safety in the process.
===================================================
This Technology Platform should have following features :
Ø A Mobile App [ WatchDog ? ], using which anyone can select any given Police
Station and watch real-time live
video streaming of the CCTV in the interrogation room .
Ø A portal { www.IndianPoliceStations.gov.in
} , where a dashboard displays dynamically, number of viewers ( citizen )
watching, each of the 16,671 police stations . In-charge of a Police Station
would get to know this number and get motivated to conduct the interrogation in
a humane / polite manner
Ø An inbuilt “ Language Translation Software “, since ( presumably ), interrogating officer is most likely to be using the language of the person being interrogated. Citizen watching live streaming should be enabled to understand the dialogue taking place
Related Readings :
Government announces list of 10 best
performing police stations in India
Live
Streaming of Court Proceedings
AI
come to judgement ? Not for a while !
Who
watches the Watchmen ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqeQByqf_f8
Singularity
: an Indian Concept ?
With regards,
Hemen Parekh / hcp@RecruitGuru.com / 06
Dec 2020
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