Microsoft for Indian police stations digitisation

New Delhi, Oct 30: If everything goes according to plan like the masterly executed murders in a Raymond Chandler crime fiction, investigation in India's 23,000-odd police stations will go digital with the help of US software giant Microsoft Corporation.

Microsoft India has developed a software technology to record crime scenes without leaving any scope for tampering. Starting from gathering material evidence to writing a First Information Report (FIR), the technology talks of a national crime data which could be shared by Centre and states to catch even terrorists.

Under the 'Scene of Crime Application' of Microsoft, tablet PCs and smartphones will replace note books of detectives looking for evidence.

''There will be no more corrupting of investigation if we use this technology. No FIRs can be tampered with,'' Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal told reporters at a demontration of the software here today.

Also in the offing is speedy justice and state-of-the-art trial of cases with magistrates able to catch daily progress of investigation at the click of a mouse.

With digitised content all round, power point presentations in courts could be the next step.

''The application allows creation of a countrywide database of crimes committed anywhere in India,'' said Mr Ravi Venkatesan, Chairman of Microsoft India.

The application can run in 14 Indian languages supported by Microsoft India in the digitisation area.

The Science and Technology Ministry, which collaborated with Microsoft India to develop the technology, says it will approach the Planning Commission and the government to implement the plan.

The whole cost of the project for the country's about 23,000 police stations could be as much as Rs 230 crore, said Mr Sibal.

who also would be talking to the Supreme Court about the technology.

The arrival of technology in crime scenes will, however, require changes in judicial guidelines to make the nature of evidence gathered by digital devices admissible in courts.

''The nature of evidence from this application will have to be made admissible,'' said Mr Sibal exuding confidence in the implementation of the technology.

To start with, the Dehra Dun and Jaipur Dehat police stations have joined the Microsoft project by using it on an experimental basis.

But like every masterly executed murder leaves one clue for the investigator to solve, the Microsoft plan could suffer from the possible lack of coordination between states and the Centre in crime fighting, which falls under the jurisdiction of states.

UNI