K’taka police launch e-beat to assist seniors living alone

Bengaluru: As part of its Aasare project, Karnataka police have set up e-beat points in areas across the state with clusters of senior citizens living alone, allowing officers to log visits and automatically notify family members, ensuring both monitoring and timely assistance. Between Jan 17 and March 31, the project, which is scheduled for completion by June-end, helped identify 20,459 houses across the state where seniors live alone.Launched by DG-IGP MA Saleem in mid-Jan, Aasare aims to keep track of seniors by visiting their homes and collecting details, including mobile phone numbers of the elderly and their close family members.Whenever cops visit these citizens, they mark their visit on the e-beat point and a message is automatically sent to the children or other close family members of the seniors. "The Manemanege police (police visit to each house) initiative has helped us collect details about senior citizens living alone. All those aged 60 and above and living alone are covered under Aasare," Saleem said, noting his experience with similar initiatives in Udupi, Hassan, and Mysuru.Jurisdictional police frequently visit these seniors, assisting with doctor appointments, hospital visits, and fetching medicines."Frequent police visits serve two purposes: they offer a sense of security and help seniors run errands, such as getting cooking gas cylinders or resolving issues with power connections," said ADGP (law and order) R Hitendra.ChallengesShivamogga SP B Nikhil highlighted difficulties in reaching remote villages inside dense forests. "Some elderly people have no mobile or landline. In such cases, we coordinate with neighbors to maintain communication," he said.He added that many seniors are initially uncomfortable with police visits. "To make them feel at ease, we are deploying more women police personnel to interact with them," Nikhil said.BOXSenior citizens living alone — district & city-wise dataDistrict Households Chitradurga 1,710 Shivamogga 1,648 Udupi 1,412 Hassan 945 Belagavi (district) 926 Ramanagar 908 Uttara Kannada 840 Gadag 664 Cities City Households Bengaluru 839 Mysuru 480 Mangaluru 379 Kalaburagi 310 Belagavi (city) 214 Overall Total identified households 20,459 E-beat points set up 14,269