NEW DELHI: The mobile apps that Delhi Police has developed are gradually getting traction among citizens. The downloads of the three most important applications — Himmat Plus, Senior Citizens and Tatpar — have increased considerably. In 2016, Delhi Police launched the Senior Citizens app with an SOS button connected to a helpline for emergency use by elderly Delhiites. The app also facilitates easy registration of such citizens and gives them access to the names and telephone numbers of beat officers. To protect elderly people from fraud, the app has guidelines related to cyber safety too. “Any grievance or query made through the app goes to the police’s senior citizens’ cell, from where it is routed to the police station concerned,” an officer said. The cops claimed that since inception, there have been 38,094 downloads, with an increase of 112% in 2022 in downloads compared with the figure in 2021 till August. Another officer said complaints on this app received till date mostly involved electricity and water bills, requests for purchase of grocery items, problems with stray dogs and, sometimes, complaints of having been cheated. Before that, in January 2015, Delhi Police had launched Himmat SOS app for women. The app can be used to send a distress call and emergency messages to the cops and specified contacts. In 2018, it was relaunched as Himmat Plus after some technical shortcomings were resolved. Police said the app was made bilingual and the registration process was simplified too. Police data shows 31,208 downloads of Himmat Plus till September 26. The police officer compared the data of two years to show an increase of 36% in 2022 (till August) against 2021. The most popular among all the apps is Tatpar, launched in 2019. It has been downloaded 1.18 lakh times till September 26. The app offers more than 50 citizen-centric services and has features like an e-FIR registration, lost reports complaints, unclaimed vehicle search, traffic alert, SOS video calls, traffic notice payment, details of missing or stolen mobile phones, complaint lodging and status, towed vehicles notification, signal faults, missing persons, among others. According to the data, it was used more than 48,000 times to file for lost reports, over 68,000 times for theft eFIRs and over 49,000 times for filing complaints related to motor vehicle theft. “People also used the app more than 62,000 times to navigate jurisdictional police stations, 54,318 times for tenant verification and 32,7022 times for traffic notice payment,” the officer said. A police officer said that to increase awareness of these citizen-friendly apps, Delhi Police has launched awareness campaigns on social media platforms. “We also create awareness about the importance and utility of the apps through conventional advertising. Our beat staff contact the local target persons and brief them about benefits and the facilities offered by these apps,” the officer said. A senior police officer said the force’s endeavour was to ensure that services reached the citizens seamlessly. “In a step towards this end, more and more police services are being digitised,” she said.
Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/delhi/tech-tonic-police-apps-find-many-takers-among-citizens/articleshow/95055600.cms