The State Home Department in Maharashtra is gearing up for a significant overhaul of its top police leadership, including the position of Director General of Police (DGP) and Police Commissioners of Nagpur and Thane. The impending retirement of the current DGP, Rajnish Seth, on December 31 has prompted the department to commence the process of selecting his successor.A top rank official said that several prominent names have emerged as contenders for the esteemed position of State DGP. The frontrunner is Senior IPS Officer Rashmi Shukla, who currently serves as the Director General (DG) of Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB). Mumbai Police Commissioner Vivek Phansalkar is also a strong candidate for the role. Other notable contenders include Thane CP Jaijeet Singh, DG ATS Sadanand Date, DG Police Housing Sandeep Bishnoi, DG Railway Pradnya Sarvade, Additional Director of NIA Atulchandra Kulkarni, and DG State Security Corporation Bipin Kumar Singh, he said. He further stated that the State Home
Police establishment though quick to promulgate orders about framing time bound programme for deciding on transfers within the force, however the same police bosses of Maharashtra Police seem to have forgotten about the power vested with them. To date the meeting of Police Establishment Board No. 2 that has Director General of Police (DGP) Satish Mathur as its Chairman was not been held and hence question mark hangs on general transfers of officers including that of Sub-Inspector, Assistant Police Inspector and Police Inspector.
DGP Satish Mathur
It was DGP Mathur who issued a circular on January 20, 2017, about General Transfers (GT) for Police Establishment No. 2. Unit Commanders were directed to gather transfer requests in February and send to DGP by April 3, 2017. DGP office reserved entire April for inspection of request letters and was to conduct meetings of PEB 2 between April 1 to 7 and transfer orders were to be issued thereafter.
However, DGP Mathur has failed to stick to schedule laid down by himself. So if top police boss himself is showing scant respect to his own order what can people expect from others in Police Department, said a retired police officer. Inspector General of Police (IGP) Establishment Rajkumar Vhatkar accepted that meeting of Police Establishment No. 2 was not held and when pressed for reason he stated, members were busy and hence could not meet. Vhatkar further said no date is fixed for holding the meeting. DGP Mathur failed to respond to repeated phone calls.
A senior official commented that issuing order and not conducting meeting sends a bad message in police department which prides itself as disciplined force. Such type of time bound programme was introduced for first time in the force. However the top cop of Maharashtra Police failed to take initiative to ensure implementation of the programme in the larger interest of the force is surprising.
Police Establishment Board came into being following rap by the Apex Court. The time bound transfers with schedule of April-May was fixed to ensure police officers get enough time to settle down in transferred place. The two months are most important also from point of view of academic interest of wards of police officers as during this time schools are processing new admission. The summer time is also when the academic session ends and provides enough space for families to decide on schools or colleges to take admission.
But with DGP office itself failing to stick to deadline the middle rank officers of Maharashtra Cadre would once again be waiting endlessly for transfers. So in nutshell the effect of Supreme Court order is being negated.
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