Why Mumbai Police is finding it hard to crack crimes at night

Come nighttime and most of Mumbais CCTV cameras are no better than a deer caught in the headlights As soon as motorists switch on their headlamps or backlights the cameras are blinded by the light Thanks to this city cops are having trouble solving night crimes even those that have been captured on camera since the image quality is very poorThe surveillance of vehicles is a big challenge when their headlamp or backlight is switched on since the image noise glare foils the footage quality said a police officer Sharpeyed detection teams of the Mumbai police instead try to solve night crimes based on a few recognisable features of vehicles captured in the CCTV footageCameras go night blindMany detection officers said the surveillance quality becomes disastrous at intersections where multiple headlamps from oncoming automobiles hamper the cameras vision This is the reason offences committed at night are either detected late or remain unsolved lamented another copSome cameras have Automatic Number Plate Recognition but more such devices are requiredMany DCPrank officers confirmed that they have been facing such issues for years They also raised another issue pixelation of images If we zoom in on a distant vehicle the image pixelates said an officer while emphasising that not all CCTV cameras are the same There are a few that can zoom upto 10X he addedA traffic cop said There are a few night vision cameras that capture the number plates of speeding vehicles clearly at night At a few important junctions we have also installed revolving cameras The most advanced CCTV cameras are at the Bandra Worli Sea Link where a senior officer said 88 surveillance lenses are equipped with night vision They can zoom into vehicles 2 km away and automatically cut out the glareSolutionsMany officers hope that this issue will be addressed in the proposed project to add another 5000 cameras to the citys CCTV network A detection officer said The quality of CCTV image becomes superior if light is directed towards the subject and not at the camera Alternatively if the surveillance lenses are mounted at a higher level the high beam from vehicles might not disturb the footageA fortnight later the crime branch identified the truck from CCTV footage taken minutes before the accident while there was still daylightPlacing the cameras higher will also help with another surveillance issue this paper had reported last week mdash the Metro barricades On November 4 midday had reported that the tall barricades were restricting CCTV cameras field of vision across the city frontpage report Metro work is nuisance for police tooAnother cop suggested that the state bring in more advanced devices such as Automatic Number Plate Recognition ANPR cameras that make detection much simpler Amitesh Kumar joint commissioner of traffic police said Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras have been installed at various strategic locations in the city We change the locations of these ANPR cameras as and when requiredMeanwhile the police are relying on CCTV footage from shops and residential societies as well A senior officer from south Bombay said We would face issues in detecting housebreaking cases as the intense vehicle lights would wash out the faces of the perpetrators So we asked all housing societies as well as shop ownersto install CCTV cameras in their premises This helped us too4746No of existing police CCTV cameras in cityCase studiesPowai hitandrun Headlights made it hard to identify the truck that ran over a biker A fortnight later the crime branch zeroed in on the accused by checking daytime footage from shortly before the mishap see picsParle bagsnatching In September an elderly couples bag was snatched by a biker CCTV footage of the bikers number plate was fuzzy The case remains unsolved till dateColaba molestation A journalist was groped by bikers in May Cameras captured the molester but not his license plate He was caught a week laterCrawford Marketmurder A sex worker was murdered in March Cops couldnt see the number plate of the taxi in which the killer fled but recognised the wheel caps on the vehicle The cabbie led the cops to the killer a week laterCatch up on all the latest Crime National International and Hatke news here Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get latest updates