THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Home minister Ramesh Chennithala said that mobile and surveillance cameras were threatening the privacy of individuals in the state.
“There has been a marginal increase in cases where mobile and surveillance cameras are being employed to violate the privacy of individuals in the state,” the minister revealed in the Assembly on Monday.
The minister said that the Cyber Cell had been conducting awareness against the use mobile and CCTV cameras. “The Cell is trying to spread the message that the misuse of such gadgets is a cognisable offence,” the minister said.
He said that directions had already been given to companies selling such gadgets against misuse. Guidelines have also been issued for shops selling CCTV cameras.
“Police has also been asked to conduct routine raids of hostels, hotels, lodges and textile shops to check misuse of such cameras,” the minister said.
Ironically, at a time when the state is making students aware of the dangers of invisible cameras, the government is planning to install surveillance cameras in government-run children’s homes, special homes and observation homes.
The stated objectives are to prevent violence against children inside the home and to check the increasing frequency of escape from homes.
Though it could check escape from homes, the installation of CCTV cameras in children’s homes, many say, has disturbing implications.
“It is understandable if these surveillance gadgets are placed in special and observation homes, where children in conflict with law are lodged. But a Children’s home is where children in need of care and protection, mostly poor and the orphaned and the differently-abled are lodged. To place cameras inside a children’s home is as shocking as placing cameras inside individual homes,” a senior Social Justice Department official said.
The Department, however, has washed its hands of the decision. “We are just following a Central directive,” the official said.
