Centre empanels Dinkar Gupta as Director General

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 30

The Appointments Committee of the Union Cabinet has approved the empanelment of DGP Dinkar Gupta as the Director General/DGE. This makes him eligible to head Central intelligence agencies, paramilitary forces and investigation agencies like the CBI and NIA.

According to a government spokesperson, Gupta is one of the 11 officers from the 1987 batch of the IPS — which originally had over 100 officers all over the country — to be empanelled by the government to hold DGP-level as well as DGP-equivalent-level posts at the Centre. He is the only IPS officer from north India (Punjab, Haryana, HP, J&K, UP, Uttarakhand and Rajasthan) to be chosen for this post.

The only other serving IPS officer of the Punjab cadre, who has been empanelled as a DGP to hold such posts at the Centre, is Samant Goel, R&AW chief.

Gupta is presently posted as the DGP of Punjab since February 7, 2019. Before being posted as head of the 80,000-plus police force of the state, Gupta was also posted as the DGP, Intelligence, Punjab, which involved the direct supervision of the Punjab State Intelligence Wing, State Anti-Terrorist Squad and Organised Crime Control Unit. If offered a post at the Centre, it will be up to Gupta to accept or decline the offer, the spokesperson said.

An experienced and distinguished officer, Gupta did an eight-year stint on Central deputation with the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) from June 2004 to July 2012, where he held many sensitive assignments, including the head of the Dignitary Protection Division of the MHA.