When seniors saved the day

Satish K Sharma

FOR a police officer, retiring honourably is like completing a marathon in a minefield. So, when I achieved that, I thanked God and all the seniors who had saved me from troubles, some of them of my own making, from time to time.

In 1989, I was ASP at Mangrol, a coastal subdivision in Junagadh district of Gujarat. In terms of scenic beauty, it was like a slice of Kerala with rows of coconut groves along the Arabian Sea. The workload was light, and with wife and a newborn daughter, it was like a vacation in Eden.

One day, I received a trunk call from the state Home Secretary. Why did he have to call me, bypassing the SP, DIG and DG? Well, I braced myself for the worst and took the call. I could barely mumble a greeting before he asked in half-jest, ‘Do you want to be transferred out?’

I said, ‘No. Why?’

He said the local MLA, an elderly woman, had asked for my transfer out of the subdivision, complaining that I was arrogant and had not bothered to call on her even after she had become a minister.

‘Have you not called on her?’ he asked. I said no. He asked me to do so the next time she was in the town because the rules required that. Well, I did that and survived. Through his timely advice, the Home Secretary saved me from a premature transfer.

A few months later, I received a call from the DGP of the state. He came straight to the point. ‘I have read your letter to the editor in today’s daily, criticising His Excellency, the State Governor. It is against conduct rules. Don’t do it again,’ he said in a flat tone and disconnected the call.

He closed the matter without even asking for my verbal explanation. I learnt a lesson in how to correct a well-meaning, if immature, junior.

A year later, as the DCP of Vadodara city, I was trying to control the situation along with other officers after the outbreak of communal riots. My fellow DCP ordered firing in which a young man was killed. It created an uproar and there was talk in the press about bringing up murder charges against the police.

We were worried because at least two IPS officers in the state were facing complaints of murder arising from deaths in police firing. But somehow the issue petered out and we survived.

More than 20 years later, I was Police Commissioner, Vadodara, when a senior lawyer came to meet me. He recalled my earlier tenure as a DCP and the death in police firing. ‘Do you know how you were saved from a private complaint?’ he asked. I said no. He said the then Police Commissioner had used his goodwill of many years and persuaded the local leaders against filing a complaint. Our boss had done it all so quietly that we didn’t even know about it.