On December 30, 2019 the Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Civil Aviation Shri Hardeep Singh Puri, launched theBiometric enabled Centralised Access Control System (CACS) and ‘e-BCAS Project Training Module’ in New Delhi. These 2 projects were launched to enhance security and to improve ease of doing business at airports.
Centralised Access Control System project:
i.The project covers 43 Airports of AAI (Airports Authority of India) and 5 Joint Venture(JV) airports.
ii.Aim:The project aims to digitize the employee movement process at the airports. Around 2 lakhs employees of various stakeholders will be assisted by CACS. This is done to reduce certain usage of areas to a specific set of AEP (Airport Entry Permit) holders.
iii.Features: The CACS will encompass uniqueness of the AEP users, biometric authentication in addition to PIN (Personal Identification Number)-based identity verification through contactless smart card technology.
- Smart card technology: It manages access of persons using RFID (Radio-frequency identification) based automated vehicle access control system, gate access privileges etc. The card costs Rs. 225 and will be valid for 3 years.
- Biometric ID (Biometric enabled Centralised Access Control System having chip embedded smart AEPs) thus issued, will be non-duplicable.
iv.ECIL and BCAS MoU: Electronics Corporation of India Limited(ECIL) and Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) signed a MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) on December 17, 2015 with Rs.34.92 crore investment. The MoU was signed to reduce human intervention by digitizing existing mechanisms.
- The AAI successfully conducted SAT (Site Acceptance Test) at various airport i.e., Ahmedabad(Gujarat), Chennai (Tamil Nadu) & Kolkata (West Bengal) recently.
- Till date, BCAS has been issuing laminated paper based AEP at the 48 airports.
‘e-BCAS Project Training Module:
i.Through this module, more than 1.5 lakh employees will be migrated from manual to digital platform.
ii.e-BCAS project has the objective of making all the activities in the BCAS transparent, user-friendly, and efficient.
iii.All Aviation Security Training Institutes (ASTIs) which is currently 29 in number, have been registered as user entities and can make nominations for various online courses.
iv.Features: The system will allow the users to check the approvals by BCAS, declaration of results and QR coded online certificate generation etc thus leading to transparent as well as efficient training ecosystem of BCAS. Before the launch of this project, the entire training process was done manually.
v.BCAS functions: It conducts training, testing and certification courses through its International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) Certified ASTC (Aviation Security Training Centre in New Delhi) and through approved ASTIs of various Airlines etc.
- Apart from these, international courses by ICAO, Department for Transport, United Kingdom, and Transport Security Authority of the United States of America(USA) are also conducted by ASTC in India.
e-BCAS Project:
i.The project is envisaged to achieve “paperless office” under e-Governance initiative of Govt. of India and was approved by the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) at an estimated cost of Rs.21.69 crore.
ii.It included training module, quality control and operational module & administration etc. After all the modifications, the current training module has been completed at a cost of Rs.30 lakhs.
