We are impressed but . . .!

Islamabad : Whenever we see a message or a video popping up on our mobile phone screens as to how keenly and vigilantly the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) Police is keeping a close watch to monitor the situation on the roads and highways, we get impressed indeed!

These videos captured by a very effective network of strategically installed CCTV Cameras and messages prepared by ICT Police Social Media experts not only provide visual guidance and spreading awareness about traffic rules, but also make the viewers to learn the mistakes leading to all kinds of accidents.

Sometime back the Islamabad Police also announced that it would be monitoring main highways and Avenues through drones, especially during the peak hours for better traffic flow management.

Recently, the ICT Police top bosses even announced that they had made a complete video of a recent protest staged in Islamabad and warned that cases would be registered against those who broke the law while using these footage(s) to identify the ‘culprits’.

But it seems that this ‘Hawk Eye’ of ICT Police gets blinded where it actually is supposed to focus more keenly to improve safety and security situation in the federal capital. We get impressed when we see a clip uploaded by ICT Police, showing how a motorcyclist has committed a crime by violating a traffic rule and caused an accident.

But we get disappointed when we watch such traffic laws violations getting even more intense each day by the hour and nobody is there to protect those who strictly follow the rules from these offenders. The ICT Police indeed has taken a smart action to use these CCTV cameras to issue E-Challans to such offenders but the actual impact of this move will take some time, in fact lot of time, to bring about desired results because of a number of discrepancies in the system.

But when see the same ‘Hawk Eye’ not being utilised to monitor crime surge and develop means to curb that trend and provide safety and security to common citizen, we get depressed.

When we watch street crime, phone snatching, purse/bag snatching, looting at gun point, thefts, dacoities increasing by the day and the same ‘Hawk Eye’ not being used to keep a check on that, we get very depressed.

When we watch people openly engaging and encouraging kite-flying in urban as well as rural areas of the federal capital, causing serious problems to peaceful citizens and the police not even trying to stop the practice, we get depressed. When we read in the newspapers about the thefts in homes and shops in the markets and watch the video clips of criminals daringly operating in the video clips uploaded by the victims who have installed their own CCTV cameras and yet ICT Police not taking action, we get depressed!

If the ICT Police can identify the protesters defying Section 144 and register cases against them, what is stopping them to identify the criminals engaged in thefts and dacoities from those CCTV camera footages and take action against them that make us very depressed!

One wonders when the ICT Police bosses will actually start using the modern technology available at hand to keep an eye on preventing crimes and not confine it only to the roads and highways to make clips of such accidents and rule violations?