16,000 police personnel to be stationed across Chennai on Kaanum Pongal

CHENNAI: As many as 16,000 police personnel will be deployed for security duty by the Greater Chennai Police (GCP) on Thursday to regulate and monitor crowds visiting public places like Marina Beach on Kaanum Pongal (January 16). Additionally, 1,500 Home Guard volunteers will be stationed at the Marina.

Temporary mini control rooms and assistant booths have been set up at the seven entrances of the service road from Labour statue to Lighthouse. Mechanized boats with 200 swimmers will also be stationed at the beaches.

At Marina Beach, watch towers have been erected in which three cops will be posted, equipped with walkie-talkies, megaphones and binoculars. This is in addition to the CCTV cameras installed at 12 vital places, and monitoring on wide screens in the temporary control room.

“Public are not allowed to venture into the sea on Wednesday. A temporary fencing has been erected along the coast,” an official release said.

Three ATV (All Terrain Vehicles) and mounted branch personnel will be patrolling the sands to prevent theft, and also to prevent people from venturing into the sea. Trained GCP personnel and swimmers of Coastal Security Group (CSG) will also be deployed along the coast.

Similar arrangements are made at Elliots Beach too. Families with children will be issued ID cards which will have details of name, parent, address and mobile number of the parent, tied on the hands of the child. Eight drone cameras – four each at Marina and Elliots beaches will be utilised.

Police assistance booths have been set up at prominent public gathering places including Children’s Park, Guindy, Tamil Nadu Government Tourism Exhibition at Island Grounds and amusement parks. Road Safety Teams of the GCTP will patrol in two-wheelers and checkpoints have been set up at important traffic junctions to prevent over-speeding and bike racing on arterial roads.

Over 4.13 lakh denizens travel to native places on weekend

In the first two days of special bus operations from the city, a total of 4,13,215 passengers travelled to their native places for the Pongal festival. According to an official release, the corporations operated 4,107 buses on Saturday, carrying 2,25,885 passengers.

Since January 10, 4,13,215 passengers have travelled on 7,513 buses. For the Pongal festival, the state transport undertakings had announced 21,904 buses, including 14,104 buses from Chennai to various parts of the State from January 10-13 to facilitate the travel of people returning to their hometowns. The special buses in the city are being operated from Koyambedu, Kilambakkam and Madhavaram termini.