Emergency response system gets boost with more vehicles

BENGALURU: The Emergency Response Support System (ERSS)-112 in the state, which aims to respond to calls within 15 seconds and reach the spot within 15 minutes, has been further strengthened with the addition of more vehicles.

On Saturday, Union Home Minister Amit Shah flagged off ERSS vehicles from the grandstand at Vidhana Soudha and virtually inaugurated the India Reserve Battalion Police (IRBP) unit and the ‘Police Gruha 2025’, a police housing project under which 10,500 police quarters would be constructed in the state at an outlay of Rs 2,700 crore.

Shah praised the state home department  for taking up a number of measures to modernize the force and provide all facilities to the police. He assured the state of all assistance and also appreciated the work done by the Karnataka police in the fight against the pandemic.

Karnataka Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai explained the government’s initiatives to modernize the force and appealed for providing speed boats to the Coastal Security Force to keep a check on anti-national activities beyond 11 nautical miles. He also asked for one more battalion of RAF and IRBP and more funds for modernization and taking steps for women safety.

“Under ERSS, we have a target of responding to calls within 15 seconds and reaching the spot in 15 minutes. And by next year, we want to reduce it to 10 seconds and 10 minutes,” he said. Bommai said vacancies in the department have been reduced from 23% to 11% and that recruitment is on to bring it to under 6%. “We have been waging a war against drugs and also achieved a lot of success in the last 10 months. Many people, including 23 foreign nationals were arrested and synthetic drugs were seized,” Bommai said.