Saturday, November 6, 2010

Failure to switch on CCTV hampers child abduction case

Cctv1 Sad news has reached Big Brother Watch from India of the abduction of an eleven year old baby at a Hyderabad hospital.

According to the Express Buzz, a masked woman entered the hospital and abducted the child from a ward. Efforts to trace the woman and the means by which she entered and left the hospital grounds have been retarded by the fact that "none of the 18 brand new closed circuit cameras installed inside the hospital premises were working".

The cameras were installed only two months ago to great fanfare - India's Education Minister Sudarshan Reddy turning them on for the first time. Police Chief Akun Sabharwal said:

"With no one being able to see her face, the idea of preparing her sketch also could not take off. After repeated instances of abduction of infants from Niloufer Hospital, city police issued notices to the hospital management to implement safety measures. However, after the grand unveiling cameras were not made functional".

As Big Brother Watch has said in the past, cases like this are sadly far from unique.
If CCTV is to be used - and a hospital ward full of young children is absolutely the kind of place is should - then the least those in positions of power could do is ensure it is switched on.