Help just a call away

For those in peril, the help that they can surely rely upon is only a call away. It is more so, even for the women techies travelling in night cabs or for that matter any woman in distress having none around to come to her rescue.

In such a dire situation, remember to “Dial 100” and you are saved by all means from the unsavoury circumstances.

Senior police officials opine that things would have been different had the techie kidnapped from the Inorbit Mall in the city on October 18 last, used “Dial 100” service promptly instead of trying to call her friend in Bengaluru for help at that late hour. The rescue teams and police parties were positioned all the way as part of routine deployment. But precious time was already lost by the time they got the alert. “Is it the social milieu in which we live in that prevented her from counting on the help of police at a time when she required it badly? Or is she not aware of the kind of help that would have been forthcoming in the event of seeking help from “Dial 100” service?”

Madhapur police formed special teams to rescue the victim after receiving a complaint at 11 pm. But, the perpetrators abandoned her after assaulting her sexually near Tellapur on the outskirts of the city at 2.30 am on October 19. Though the accused were nabbed by the police within 72 hours, the incident was classified as a preventable crime.

The ‘Dial 100’ service, transfers an emergency call to the nearest police station within 40 seconds. Cyberabad commissioner CV Anand said that there was poor awareness over “Dial 100” service among women. “Even school children in the US are familiar with emergency number 911. “But for many reasons, women in our society are not using “Dial 100” service,” he lamented.

“Had she used the emergency service, she would have been rescued either by policemen from surrounding police stations such as Raidurgam or Narsingi located around the ORR or patrolling teams that were busy scanning roads thoroughly almost round-the-clock,” he claimed. On the importance of the service, he said that the “Dial 100” could easily tackle such kind of incidents. The “Dial 100” project was equipped with modern technology which helped tracing the assailant at the earliest, he added.

Hyderabad Additional Commissioner of Police Anjani Kumar said that he would always advise women in distress to contact “Dial 100” system even though lodging a complaint directly with the police had its own advantages.

The “Dial 100” Emergency Medical and Research Institute (EMRI) campus set up at Kompally can address calls from landline or mobile phones from anywhere in the State and transfer them to the nearest police station within 40 seconds. The installed capacity was one lakh calls per day over 100 lines. Non-medical emergencies such as an attempt to murder, kidnap, rioting, bomb blasts, drowning, rapes, domestic violence, accidents, dacoities, robberies, chain-snatching and damage to property can be reported through the service.