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Besides, two new apps of the 999-service will be launched soon. The police chief will inaugurate the apps soon. One is SOS, where a person can communicate with us just by pressing a single button. The other one is for ambulance service. Currently, we have 10,000 ambulances registered with our system.

DS: What is your response time now?

Tabrak Ullah: We are trying to minimise our response time. Currently, it takes around 15 to 20 minutes to respond to a call on average. This is mainly because police, fire service or ambulance services often face difficulty reaching destinations due to busy roads, narrow roads, or traffic jam.

For this reason, it is not possible to reach destinations or cross 20-kilometre distances within five or ten minutes.

Outside the city, police stations have to cover around 20 to 30 kilometres, which delays response time too. In addition, we are working to include the facility of automatic locations and caller identification with our systems so that we don’t have to waste time on these simple questions.

DS: How do police stations deliver services through the 999-service?

Tabarak Ullah: We are installing Thana Disperse System (TDS) in every police station for the 999-service so that we can communicate with the police stations without delay.

TDS includes a separate telephone line, computer and a desk. There’s around 660 police stations across the country and we have already completed installing TDS in 315 of those. Besides, we have started installing “mobile data terminal” (MDT) sets in all police patrol cars to ensure quicker service. Once the MDS are installed, we will be able to monitor patrol car location from our office and direct nearby cars to rush to the aid of a support seeker.

MDT sets have already been installed in 275 patrol cars. The disperse system and MDT will also be installed in 350 fire stations and their vehicles in phases. Besides, police stations are already experts in dealing with the issues we receive calls for, so this will not be a problem for them.

DS: With all these planned expansions, what will your human resource situation be like?

Tabarak Ullah: We have around 450 staffers now, who are providing round the clock service in three separate shifts.

Besides, some 12 officials from the health ministry and six officials from fire service and civil defense are working with us. After a service seeker calls for fire hazards or ambulance service, these officials take charge of the issues and follow up on the incidents.

In the coming days, we have planned to increase our work stations to 500 so that we can receive over 500 calls in a minute. For this, we have already submitted a proposal to the Police Headquarters. The proposal asks for the staff pool to be increased to 2,888.

The cabinet has already approved 999-service to turn into a separate police unit under the lead of a police officer, who is at least of deputy inspector general rank on November 30, 2020. The fire service and health ministry officials will work with the unit jointly under the DIG.

The unit office will be situated in Demra and a 22-storied building has been constructed there. On top of this, seven-bigha land has already been acquired there from the land ministry and the land filling process has been started.

DS: Though caller identity was not supposed to be disclosed, there has been some allegations related to this, with some support seekers allegedly facing problems due to this. What do you have to say about this?

Tabarak Ullah: We do not disclose any caller’s identity. But if any caller’s identity gets leaked from the local police then we can take necessary action through proper investigation. We do not want any help seeker to get into any sort of trouble related to their identity. Ensuring safety of service seekers is our top priority.

DS: What are the challenges to ensure a smoother 999-service experience?

Tabarak Ullah: Due to our limited work stations, callers sometimes find our numbers busy, especially during the peak hours of 2pm to 10pm.

Once the number of workstations here are increased, this problem will hopefully no longer be there. Besides, the number of staffers also needs to be increased for smoother service delivery as well.