College creates device to make cab rides safer

Kolkata: Students and teachers of Institute of Engineering and Management (IEM) in Salt Lake have come up with a device, which they say might “put an end to unsafe cab ride particularly for the women who often have to travel alone”.

“We are concerned with the incidents of molestation and misbehaviour with women by cab drivers. The cases have gone up with the introduction of app-based cab services like Ola and Uber. The device divides the car cabin into two chambers. The rear seat passenger and the front seat of the driver are separated by a steel mesh. Also, the rear seat doors have been fitted with two additional safety latches, that will prevent the driver or any miscreant to open the door, unless the passenger does it on his/ her own,” Prof. Satyajit Chakrabarti, director of IEM said.

The institute has written to the central transport ministry, the state transport ministry as well as cab aggregators, urging them to make the device mandatory in cabs. “We have also demonstrated it before the Bidhannagar Police Commissionerate,” prof Chakrabarti said.  

Written communication has also been sent to some leading car manufacturers for introducing this device. Students and faculty members have also come up with a low cost fully autonomous GPS based quadcopter for disaster management. Both the innovations were demonstrated at the IEM campus on Saturday.

IEM is the first private engineering college in Bengal. “We have applied for patents in both these innovations. Last year we had applied for 23 patents,” he said.