E-Paper
U.P. Police, Meta agreement saves 2 lives within a week
Under the prevailing agreement between Uttar Pradesh Police and Facebook from March 2022, if any person posts something related to suicide or self-harm on Facebook or Instagram, then Meta Headquarters in USA immediately sends an alert to the social media centre of UP Police headquarters through phone and email.
Lucknow An agreement signed between Meta (Facebook’s parent company) and Uttar Pradesh Police saved two people’s lives in the state in a span of less than a week.
One of them was a college student in Ambedkar Nagar district, who said in an Instagram post late Friday night that she was going to commit suicide and posted pictures of pills she intended to take.
The other incident occurred in Ghaziabad police commissionerate on January 31, when a man preparing to hang himself from a ceiling fan, beamed a live telecast of the act on Instagram.
In both cases, the tech giant managed to foil their attempts by alerting the local police, who traced the two people and stopped them from committing suicide.
“Under the prevailing agreement between Uttar Pradesh Police and Facebook from March 2022, if any person posts something related to suicide or self-harm on Facebook or Instagram, then Meta Headquarters in USA immediately sends an alert to the social media centre of UP Police headquarters through phone and email,” said Rahul Srivastav, additional superintendent of police ATS/In-charge of Social Media Centre of UP Police,
on Sunday.
He added that more than 10 lives had been saved so far. In Ambedkar Nagar incident, Meta sent an alert to the social media centre of UP Police at 11.37 pm with her details, after which police reached the woman’s place in 15 minutes, thwarted her bid and took her family into confidence, Srivastav said.
On the directions of additional director general, law and order, Prashant Kumar, superintendent of police of Ambedkar Nagar Ajit Kumar Sinha has deputed a woman officer Rukmani Verma to counsel the girl.
In the Ghaziabad incident, after receiving an alert from the social media centre of UP Police, Vijayanagar police station inspector Anita Chauhan reached the spot within 13 minutes and prevented the man from killing himself. The man was depressed after losing ₹90,000 in business.
The Ghaziabad Police counselled the man and spoke to his family.
“UP Police are making diverse use of social media for the cause of public service, offering a bouquet of online services. We have a dedicated and well-trained team of more than 500 police personnel who work round-the-clock to render any kind of assistance,” he said.
Srivastav said, “Considering the sensitivity of the issue, we are coming up with a detailed SOP for such cases in which there shall be a provision for sustained follow-up and counselling by professional counsellors of UNICEF. We also sensitise the district-level officers to regularly keep in touch with the victim and ensure all possible help.”
(With inputs from agencies )
