When Anjali, a resident of Indiranagar was frustrated by the crowding of auto rickshaws on CMH Road, she decided to use her phone to solve the issue. How? Anjali is part of a WhatsApp group for local residents and traffic police officials, and there, she posted about the crowding. The very same day, the issue was resolved, as the traffic police swung into action on Anjali’s complaint.
Like Anjali, residents across Bengaluru are increasingly taking to the popular messaging application to draw the attention of civic officials to day-to-day issues. WhatsApp groups involving residents and public officials including MESCOM, BBMP, Police and Water Supply Board have cropped up across Bengaluru to improve the accountability and responsiveness of the officials in charge.
One such group in Indiranagar, has won over the confidence of residents by swiftly responding to queries and issues posted on the WhatsApp group involving residents and the local traffic police.
Initiated by Praveen, a resident of Indiranagar, the WhatsApp group sees members reporting issues ranging from illegal parking, people riding without helmets and excessive honking, among other day-to-day problems. Police personnel from Halasuru and Jeevanbheema Nagar actively respond and follow up on the complaints.
One such instance is the story of how a pre-paid auto stand was set up outside the Indiranagar metro station. The problem of haphazard auto parking in Indira Nagar existed for over a year, but when residents like Anjali posted on the WhatsApp group to bring the issue to the notice of traffic officials, they arrived at a solution quite soon.
When Praveen started the group a year ago, it was not met with the same enthusiasm with which it is used today. He added residents and local traffic police officials, however there was no activity on the group.
“When we created the group, there were hardly any messages. The ACP at the time even quit the group after some time. It was after Abhishek Goyal became the DCP that the group became active and police officers started responding to queries by residents,” said Praveen.
Abhishek Goyal, Deputy Commissioner of Police – Traffic East, Bengaluru, is a computer science engineer from IIT Delhi, and was among the first set of officers to set up a Twitter account. Today, with almost 3,000 tweets and over 82,000 followers, he is one of the more active users of social media platforms, constantly engaging with residents and responding to complaints.
The WhatsApp groups consists of members of resident welfare associations in Indira Nagar, Defence Colony, HAL and covers traffic jurisdictions of Halasuru and Jeevanbheema Nagar Traffic police stations.