Taking a cue from the Chandigarh traffic police, the city Municipal Corporation will start issuing challans through online surveillance to those dumping waste in the open. It has already installed CCTV cameras with an alert system at 10 garbage vulnerable points (GVP).
A total of 35 such GVPs have been identified where littering is consistently done. Such spots will have CCTV cameras by next month. At least 10 spots have already been covered and officials have started getting live feed on their mobile phones.
As per the plan, by the end of November, all CCTV cameras will be connected with Chandigarh Smart City Limited’s supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) centre in Sector 17. It will work on the lines of the Integrated Command and Control Centre in Sector 17 where all traffic junction cameras are connected and from where the traffic police issue challans to erring motorists.
“The only difference is that the traffic violations get recorded automatically and later the police verify the footage to issue challans. In case of SCADA, we will have our staff members monitor the 35 GVPs and act against violators,” said an official, adding those dumping garbage in the open would be fined Rs 12,200.
“Through these high-definition cameras while sitting at SCADA, we will identify the registration numbers of the vehicles from where the garbage is dumped and issue challans accordingly. In case of the dumping of garbage by any neighbouring civic body, we will identify its vehicles and act. As far as individual defaulters are concerned, they generally belong to nearby places. They will be identified based on pictures. We will track them and issue challans through the area sanitation wing,” an official said.
The MC said there were earlier 100 such garbage dumping sites, but following awareness and regular monitoring, these were reduced to 35. Most of these points are in market areas and open grounds where people often throw waste, which gradually turns into a garbage dumping site. The MC has spent about Rs 39.96 lakh on the cameras.
