Ramlila Maidan among spots for which police issued surveillance camera tender in July

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​Nearly two and a half months before Delhi Police denotified Jantar Mantar as a protest site and designated three new protest venues — Ramlila Maidan, Burari Ground in north Delhi, and CBD Ground in east Delhi — it had issued a tender for 338 cameras, including facial recognition models, to be installed across central and New Delhi districts. The VVIP gate of Ramlila Maidan was one of the spots covered by the tender, worth ₹15.66 crore, with others including Turkman Gate, Delhi Gate, Raj Ghat, the India Gate C-Hexagon, Mandi House and Patiala House.

The Internet Freedom Foundation, a digital rights organisation, flagged the issue in a report whose details The Hindu has independently verified.

As per the report, the tender was posted on the Government e Marketplace on July 30, five days after the Jantar Mantar protest by the Cockroach Janta Party ended.

​The 76-page request for proposal specified 248 fixed cameras, 43 pan-tilt-zoom cameras and 47 automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras. It sought the installation of 188 cameras in central Delhi and 150 in New Delhi district.

​The tender states that the cameras will cover VIP and VVIP routes and other locations for Republic Day and Independence Day celebrations. It requires the surveillance system to integrate with other Delhi Police CCTV networks, including the Safe City Project and seeks a minimum of 30 days of CCTV footage storage.

​The organisation said it could not establish whether the tender and the subsequent designation of Ramlila Maidan as a protest site were connected.

​The tender requires the successful bidder to supply and instal facial recognition system (FRS) features on 10% of the CCTV cameras, excluding the ANPR cameras, but does not specify the exact number of cameras to be equipped with the FRS technology.

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