Ideation Technology, a technology solutions firm has come up with a colour-coded e-pass system for metro railway trains; this system will be operated with the help of a mobile phone. This system has been developed to facilitate the social distancing norms and maintain the COVID-19 safety protocol.
With the help of a bot-based (web robot) technology, colour-coded passes will be generated. The e-passes will be colour-coded based on hourly time slots. These e-passes will see to that only authorised passengers will get an entry into the metro station at a prescribed time so that the maximum passenger count is maintained.
Sanjay Chatterjee, the network and security solutions head of Ideation Technology, mentioned that this e-pass system would work on similar lines to Facebook Messenger or Whatsapp.
He also mentioned that the usage of a bot would help gather details of a passenger. Details such as the passenger’s name, the boarding station, the destination point, and the intended time slot. A total of five questions will be given to a passenger, out of which his/her preferred language is one of the questions, which he or she needs to answer via the link provided in the mobile phone. A passenger will have three language options to choose from – English, Bengali, and Hindi.
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According to the Metro authorities, 400 passengers is the maximum occupancy capacity of a train at any point in time. Depending on the occupancy capacity, an intended time slot will be provided to a passenger, in case the number of passengers has reached its threshold already, a passenger will need to opt for a different time slot. The entire process should not exceed 10 to 12 seconds. Depending on the availability, a QR code will be generated instantly, and an e-pass will be provided online to a user.
The colour-coded e-passes will help security personnel to validate e-passes quickly according to the time slots and thereby queues at the entry points of the metro stations can be avoided. For example, if the colour code ‘Yellow’ is being used for a specific time slot, passengers with different colour-coded e-passed shall not be permitted to enter the metro station at that time.
The Government of West Bengal has also issued an order to permit the Metro authorities to resume services in Kolkata in a phased manner starting from 8 September.
