Kolkata, Feb 26: The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) has sought names of the Indian Police Service (IPS) officers in the West Bengal for selecting one from among them as the new permanent Director General of Police (DGP).
Currently, Peeyush Pandey is the acting DGP. The last permanent DGP in West Bengal was Rajeev Kumar’s predecessor, Manoj Malviya, who retired from his services in 2023. Sources in the state secretariat, Nabanna, said that following a communication in the matter from UPSC, the state government’s department concerned has already started the process of shortlisting the officers whose names would be recommended to the Commission.
“In all probability, the names will be forwarded to the commission by Friday,” said a state secretariat sources. Going by the seniority factor, the most probable name for selection as the new permanent DGP is Anuj Sharma, a 1991-batch I.P.S. officer and currently posted as the Director General of the West Bengal Fire and Emergency Services Department.
The other probable names that might be included in the list of recommendations are those of the current acting DGP, Peeyush Pandey, Director General (Home Guard), Natarajan Ramesh Babu, Director General to the state correctional services, Siddh Nath Gupta, and Director General (Civil Defence), Sanjay Singh.
To recall, after the retirement of the then acting DGP Rajeev Kumar on January 31 this year, the state government appointed 1993 batch I.P.S. Piyush Pandey as the acting DGP of the state police. At that point in time, the Union Government accused the state government of not sending the list of names to the UPSC within the specified time.
As a result, the Union Government refused to grant clearance for a permanent appointment for that chair. To keep the administrative work running, the state government appointed 1993 batch IPS officer Peeyush Pandey as the acting DGP. There were complications regarding the appointment of the DGP for a long time. Now, informed circles believe that the Supreme Court’s intervention is going to finally break the deadlock.
IANS
