Today in Ahmedabad, Gujarat government submitted unconditional apology to Gujarat High Court for inordinate delay in installation of CCTV cameras at all the police stations in the state and sought one month time to equip the remaining ones. In response to PIL by NGO and during hearing a contempt petition filed in this regard, the division bench of Justice Anant Dave and Justice G B Shah asked the government’s counsel to explain the reason behind the delay. Submitting unconditional apology to the court, the government counsel cited technical reasons like change in the company to which the job was awarded. He requested that one month time should be granted for the completion of the related process which the hounorable court granted. The court also asked the government to ensure installation of CCTV in the Ahmedabad crime branch police station campus too. The court had in the past taken strong action against 2 IPS officers in this regard. The petitioners counsel Ms Parul Joshi requested the court to take strict action for non-compliance of its several orders in the past.
In 2012, The High Court had asked the government to install all police stations with CCTV cameras to monitor custodial violence. During the course of hearing it has fixed several deadlines in this regard. By now out of over 550 police stations only a little over 200 have been installed with CCTV cameras. NGO through a PIL had demanded replicating the Rajkot model in other districts because all police stations in the district were equipped with CCTV cameras.
