Vizianagaram Girls develop portal for filing mobile theft plaints

By Our Special Correspondent

Four students of Vigyan Institute of Engineering for Women, Duvvada, have developed a special web portal called vzmmobiletracker.in to facilitate the WhatsApp chatbot launched by the Vizianagaram police last month to report missing and stolen mobile phones.

Four girls in fourth-year Information Technology — Adari Deepika, Jami Chandini, P.Usha Ramya Sri and Uppala Likhita — developed a web portal using Python programming in a month.

Superintendent of Police Deepika M Patil launched the web portal on Thursday. Now, people of Vizianagaram district can also complain about their lost or missing mobile phones through the web portal. The SP appreciated the efforts of the students and presented them with certificates of appreciation.

On July 8, SP launched a WhatsApp chatbot (8977945606) to receive complaints related to lost or missing mobiles. The chat bot has been well received by the public as there is no need to go to the police station to report lost or stolen mobile phones.

Vizianagaram police recovered 103 mobile phones worth Rs 16.45 lakh in just one month based on complaints received through WhatsApp chatbot. The phones were handed over to their owners at the SP office on Thursday.

After learning about the SP initiative, four girls came forward to facilitate the process and developed a web portal within a month. “Our college chairman Lau Rattaiah and CEO Lau Sriram always tell us to use our skills for society.

We developed the web portal using a Python program under the guidance of Prof Gandhi Netaji and Principal J Sudhakar,” said Jami Chandini, one of the four students who developed the portal.

Explaining the functionality and benefits of the portal, she said, "People can file complaints through the web portal by providing basic details like IMEI number, model, time, date and last location of their cellular phones."