New police stations to address specific cyber crime and narcotics cases were started in the offices of the eight divisions where the deputy commissioners of police (DCPs) are seated in Bengaluru on Tuesday.
The police station dedicated to complaints of cyber economic offences and narcotics cases in central Bengaluru is located at the DCP Office, Central division, in Ashok Nagar in the city.
The complaints from the jurisdictions of 12 stations in central Bengaluru can be filed at the newly started police stations. These stations are Halasuru Gate, Wilson Garden, Ashok Nagar, Vivek Nagar, Sheshadripuram, High Grounds, Silver Jubilee Park, Vyalikaval, Sadashiva Nagar, Cubbon Park, Vidhana Soudha and Sampangi Rama Nagar police stations.
— DCP, Central Division (@DCPCentralBCP) December 17, 2019
Similarly, the DCP offices of all eight divisions in the city will accept complaints of cases related to cyber crime and narcotic offences occurring in their jurisdictional police stations.
Previously, there was just one cyber crime police station in the city located on Infantry Road and police officials admitted that cases were piling up at the station. As of September 2019, 8,495 cases were registered in the station in 2019. This number crossed 10,000 earlier this month and the station shut down after it was unable to register complaints beyond four digits. Police officials at the station admitted that this was the case because of a software issue. The police reopened the station on December 11 after the issue was resolved.
There are also very few convictions in cyber crime cases. There were 36 convictions in cyber crime cases in Karnataka in the last six years and out of them only 5 convictions have occurred in cases registered in Bengaluru.
Officials had called for a cyber crime station to be set up in each police division in the city and suggested that the cases pertaining to each division will be handled by the respective police stations. This would ease the burden on the lone cyber crime station that was set up in the city.