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Indian temples manage crowds with biometrics

Staff CNETAsia

Published: 30 Dec 2003 11:05 GMT

Possibly the world's largest biometrics solution has been implemented in India's Tirumala temple group, offering high-tech security fingerprint security on a pilot scale, with plans to expand.

Triumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) is a conglomerate of twelve temples and sub-shrines spread across a complex in Andhra Pradesh, India. The temples receive an average 45,000 pilgrims from India and internationally every day, with the numbers fluctuating up to 150,000 on some festival days.

There are 18 fingerprint scanners installed. Two are at verification points for temple access in Triumala itself with the remainder at pilgrim enrolment centres at TTD offices in several major cities across India. A TTD official said more fingerprint scanners would be set up at all other district headquarters. Pilgrims currently register for barcoded tags. The fingerprint registration is being piloted with pilgrims who enrol for certain pujas and sevas, which are Hingu religious rituals.

The main benefit of the biometrics system will be crowd management, not security, TTD officials told the Times of India.

Bartronics India, the company that manages the biometrics system, has asked the Guinness Book of Records to examine its claim of the world's largest biometrics solution at a single location. A technical team will visit the site in Feburary 2004 to assess the claim, reported the newspaper.

Bartronics earns 1 rupee (1 pence) per pilgrim, amounting to an estimated $330,000 a year for the TTD biometrics system.