The Tamil Nadu Forest Department has deployed body-worn cameras for patrol teams in the seven forest ranges of the Hosur Forest division. The body-worn cameras will, at present, be circulated between the night and day patrol teams, to record events, as it were, and to avoid allegations of excesses by forest patrol teams.
Hosur is believed to be the first forest division in the State that has inducted body-worn cameras for its field staff.
The move comes on the heels of the death of a 48-year-old man, L. Venkatesh, of a cardiac arrest, when he was intercepted by a night patrol in Natrampalayam in the Anchetty forest range in early August. He was one of three men on a motorcycle, allegedly carrying a country rifle. According to the Forest Department, the motorcyclists, in a bid to flee, had dropped the motorbike and one of the men fell to the ground and collapsed, while the other two fled. The incident led to vandalism of an unguarded forest check post in Natrampalayam by an irate mob, leading to police cases being registered.
