M A I N   N E W S

CM’s security beefed up
Prabhjot Singh
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 19
The Punjab police has decided to deploy four of its young IPS officers in the Chief Minister’s security cell replacing the officers on deputation from the Central Reserve Police Force.

The change, sources said, had been necessitated because of a perceptible change in the security environment in the state. With the Assembly elections round the corner, there was need for stepping up the personal security of the Chief Minister, the sources added.

Initially, the government had attached Mr Kapil Dev, Superintendent of Police (Operations) Bathinda; Mr Gautam Cheema, Assistant Inspector-General of Police (Provisioning), Chandigarh; Mr Pavan Kumar Rai, ASP, Bathinda; and Mr Rajesh Kumar Jaiswal, ASP, Amritsar City, with the Chief Minister’s security.

Mr Kapil Dev and Mr Cheema belong to the 1995 batch of the IPS while Mr Rai and Mr Jaiswal are of the 1997 batch.

However, subsequently the orders of Mr Cheema and Mr Jaiswal were withdrawn. Instead, Mr S.S. Srivastava, Superintendent of Police, Headquarters, Hoshiarpur, and Mr B. Chandra Shekhar, Superintendent of Police, Headquarters, Gurdaspur, have been attached with the Chief Minister’s security on administrative grounds.

Both Mr Srivastava and Mr Chandra Shekhar belong to the 1994 batch of the IPS.

It is after a long time that the Chief Minister’s security has been mainly entrusted to IPS officers of the Punjab cadre. A couple of officers, who have been on deputation with the Punjab police from the CRPF and attached with the Chief Minister’s security , are being sent back to their parent department.

At present, Mr Khubi Ram, Mr Rampal Singh, Mr R.C. Sethi and Mr Ananaya Gautam are the Superintendents of Police from the CRPF on deputation with the Punjab police. Most of the CRPF officers are with the Chief Minister’s security. Both Mr Khubi Ram and Mr Rampal Singh are also due for promotion as Commandants in their parent cadre.

A final order on the reversion of the CRPF officers is expected soon.

Of late the Punjab police has sent back some officers from various states and Central police organisations who had been on deputation with it for a long time. Some of them had been with the Punjab police since the early 90s. Meanwhile, the Punjab police has decided to send 20 companies to West Bengal on election duty. Both West Bengal and Tamil Nadu had requested the deployment of the Punjab police in their territories for the smooth conduct of the Assembly elections to be held next month.

“We are sending our force only to West Bengal,” a senior official of the Police Department said, maintaining that the request of the Tamil Nadu Government could not be entertained because of manpower constraints.