Unsafe campus: CCTV cams at JNU gates don't work

Two days after the abduction and gang-rape of a minor girl, who was employed by a professor on the campus of Jawaharlal Nehru University, police have said none of the CCTV cameras installed at the three gates of the varsity was functioning. 

The 16-year-old maid was picked up from the main entrance of the university’s campus around 4 pm on Monday by five car-borne men and then they dropped her at the same place at 9 pm.

However, the identity of the accused couldn’t be ascertained for long due to the non-availability of the crucial CCTV footage, said a senior police officer.

After the arrest of all the accused in the case, the big question which still remains unsolved is why the cameras were not functioning at the gates of the varsity.

“These cameras were installed at the gates more than two years back. However, due to the non-availability of the fibre optic-cable to connect it with the system, they are lying non-functional. The work in this regard has been going on for a while but I can’t tell the date when it will get over,” said an official working in the security department of the university.

According to a senior police officer in charge of the area, they have written to the university authorities regarding the crucial lapse in the security arrangement on the campus, but no action seemed to have been taken from the university’s side.

“No policemen is allowed inside the JNU campus so it becomes imperative that the university authorities themselves should strengthen the security arrangement on the campus. However, we noticed the CCTV cameras were not working at the entrance gates of the varsity and had communicated to the concerned authorities regarding it, but we didn’t see any action,” said a senior police officer.

After the unravelling of the minor’s gang-rape case, JNU’s student unions have taken up the issue of security lapses to the university’s authorities and demanded a probe into it.

“The gruesome incident of rape on the campus has shaken our conscience and also the myth that JNU is a safe place for women. This also points to the failure of the university’s administration to provide security on the campus. Therefore, we demand that the administration should deploy better and more security guards at the entrance apart from installation of functioning CCTV camera at all the entrance-gates,” said Sourabh Sharma, Joint Secretary, JNU Students’ Union.