Notwithstanding central government’s directive of putting 3 IPS officers on Central deputation following the mob attack on the motorcade of the BJP’s national president JP Nadda earlier this month, the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool government, which has been at odds with the Centre, arbitrarily promoted one of them and transferred another on Monday.
Instead of releasing the 3 IPS officers on Central deputation, Mamata Banerjee arbitrarily promotes one and transfers another
According to reports, Rajeev Mishra, the 1996 batch IPS officer who was IG South Bengal but has now been promoted as ADG South Bengal. Rajeev Mishra along with Bholanath Pandey and Praveen Kumar Tripathi were in-charge of JP Nadda’s security when his convoy came under attack on December 10 while he was en route to Diamond Harbour for a workers meeting.
Bholanath Pandey who was the Diamond Harbour SP has now been transferred as the SP, Home Guard. The position of the third IPS officer, Praveen Kumar Tripathi, DIG (Presidency Range), who was also in-charge of Nadda’s security, however, remained the same.
Total of 33 officers were either transferred or promoted by the state government on Monday and IPS officers Rajeev Mishra and Bholanath Pandey were amongst them. The Mamata government has called this a routine procedure.
For the unversed, Rajeev Mishra is the same IPS officer who had shot to fame after videos surfaced of him touching Mamata Banerjee’s feet in 2019. He was in uniform. The clip had gone viral receiving flak from various quarters. Slamming the Mamata Banerjee govt, BJP leader Kailash Vijayvargiya tweeted the video with a comment in Hindi: “What kind of democracy is this?”
MHA summons three IPS officers of Bengal following the attack on JP Nadda’s convoy
The MHA on December 12 (Saturday) summoned three IPS officers of Bengal, who were responsible for providing security to BJP national head J P Nadda, to serve in central deputation following the attack on his convoy on Thursday which left several BJP leaders including Kailash Vijayvargiya injured in the process. The IPS officers sought were Rajeev Mishra (Additional Director General, South Bengal), Praveen Tripathi (Deputy Inspector General, Presidency Range) and Bholanath Pandey (SP, Diamond Harbour).
Mamata Banerjee refuses to release the officers
However, the West Bengal state government had blatantly refused to give a No Objection Certificate (NOC) and release them. This had led to a massive tug of war between MHA and Mamata Banerjee. Hitting out at the Modi government, Mamata had said that her government would not bend before “expansionist” and “undemocratic” forces.
The MHA in its second directive on December 16 had transferred Mishra to ITBP, Pandey to Bureau of Police Research and Tripathi to SSB DIG. Mamata had slammed the move and the intent to use powers “covered under emergency laws”.
