What a h'app'y way to ensure safe travel for women in State

Hyderabad: The T-SAFE App, a programme to track women’s travels for their safety, was introduced by Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy on Tuesday, when the government announced Mahila Shakthi policy. It is the first of its kind ride monitoring service by the Telangana Police in the country, which aims at making travel safer for women, children and other vulnerable groups in the State.

To use the service people can call 100 or 112 and select the newly introduced number ‘8’ in the IVR option. After making calls, citizens receive an automatic link that they may use to access the service via the T-Safe website or the Travel Safe App. The app is available on the Google Play Store.

The T-Safe App will act as a key enabler towards women’s empowerment. The CM congratulated the Telangana police for continuously working towards making the State safer for women and children.

While using the service citizens will get automated alerts on the app or by call at periodic intervals, which, if not responded to in the prescribed manner, will initiate prompt police response.

Reddy stated that T-Safe is not an App, but a service. ‘It does not require a smart phone or an app download to avail of the service. “Even if a woman has a basic phone, she can avail the T-Safe service by simply dialing 100 and choosing option 8 in IVR to initiate a ride monitoring by the T-Safe team.”

This is the first time in the country that a service enables emergency police response proactively through automation, without the citizen having to again press any button or dial 100. In case of emergency, the technology also helps send a live tracking link to the police patrol vehicle. The present fleet strength of emergency response vehicles includes 791 patrol cars and 1,085 Blue Colts. While availing the service on the app, citizens can also share live location link with their loved ones.

As part of future development, the women’s safety wing announced that they will be integrating T-Safe with other applications of cab aggregators and other private transport services.

Ministers DamodarRajanarsimha, Komatireddy Venkat Reddy, Ponguleti Srinivas Reddy, Konda Surekha, D Anasuya (Seetakka), TummalaNageswar Rao, Jupally Krishna Rao, Chief Secretary A Shanthi Kumari, Director-General of Police Ravi Gupta, Addition DGP, CID, In-charge women’s safety wing Shikha Goel, senior police officials, including the commissioners of Hyderabad, Cyberabad, Rachakonda and others were present.