Punjab Police has decided to introduce advanced smart vans that can identify e-challan defaulters and wanted criminals on roads and in public places across the province. In the initial phase, the department plans to purchase 50 Police Eye Smart Vans for automated monitoring and has sought more than Rs 500 million for the project. According to police officials, the purchase proposal has been resubmitted to the Punjab government after the objections raised by the Home Department were addressed. The project is part of a wider move toward technology based policing in the province, where traffic enforcement and the tracking of wanted individuals are increasingly handled through digital systems and camera networks.
The vans will be equipped with advanced 360-degree cameras that can identify vehicles with unpaid traffic fines as well as wanted criminals. The cameras have a range of 100 meters, which allows the system to keep updating information about vehicles and individuals within the area it covers while the van is moving. The vehicles will also be connected to the system of the Safe Cities Authority so that immediate alerts can be generated when suspicious vehicles or wanted criminals are detected. The technology will also enable police to identify overloaded vehicles and issue alerts with a single click, which adds a third use to the two main tasks of tracking unpaid fines and spotting wanted persons.
To save fuel costs, the department plans to purchase electric vehicles for the project. The vehicles will be prepared under the supervision of Additional Inspector General (IG) Logistics Fawaduddin Qureshi. Earlier reports on the Police Eye Smart Van said that the vans are also meant to detect fake number plates, that the first vehicle would be presented to the Punjab chief minister for approval, and that each vehicle with its equipment would cost around Rs 11 million. Those reports also said that one to three vehicles would be allocated to each district for monitoring, although the plan now before the government begins with 50 vans in the first phase.
For motorists, the main point is that the e-challan system is moving from fines issued at cameras on fixed points toward enforcement that can follow vehicles on the road. A driver with unpaid e-challans can be identified by a patrol van and an alert can be sent through the Safe Cities network, which links the camera on the van with the central system used by police. The proposal still needs approval from the Punjab government before the 50 vans can be purchased, and the police have not announced a date for the start of deployment, so the timeline will depend on how quickly the funding request is cleared.
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