Top cop shifted, glare on clash - Jayaraman new Siliguri commissioner

Anand Kumar

TT, Siliguri, April 19: The Siliguri police commissioner, Anand Kumar, was today transferred by the state government, a move which Trinamul Congress sources attributed to his alleged mishandling of the violence here on April 10 following the attack on minister Amit Mitra in New Delhi.

K. Jayaraman, the deputy inspector-general of the anti-corruption wing of the state police, will be the new commissioner. The Siliguri Metropolitan Police was established on August 4 last year and Kumar was the first commissioner.

Kumar, a 1998 batch IPS officer, will join as the deputy inspector general at the Police Training College, Barrackpore.

The transfer comes after CPM and SFI workers and leaders were arrested after repeated clashes between them and Trinamul supporters in Siliguri on April 10 and former state minister Asok Bhattacharya and Darjeeling CPM secretary Jibesh Sarkar were detained from the party office.

According to sources in Trinamul, north Bengal development minister Gautam Deb had called up chief minister Mamata Banerjee and complained about the police’s failure to control the situation.

“The first round of clash was managed by the police though the commissioner stayed seated in his office, which is only one-and-a-half kilometres from the spot. He arrived at the spot about an hour after the incident,” said the Trinamul source.

“Deb had pointed out that the situation had turned normal and he (Deb) left Hill Cart Road. However, another round of clash ensued and the police could not prevent it.”

Trinamul said the arrest of the CPM leaders had given the Left undue political mileage and it was also a reason for Kumar’s transfer. “His (Kumar’s) decision to enter the CPM district office in Siliguri and detain leaders like Asok Bhattacharya, Jibesh Sarkar and Saman Pathak further tarnished the government’s image. The arrests handed the Left an opportunity to project itself as a victim before the people,” said the Trinamul leader.

But a source in the home department in Calcutta said: “The transfer order has nothing to do with the political clash,” said the official.

Asked about the transfer, Deb said: “I have yet to get official information about the transfer and have learnt it from the media. It is entirely a decision taken by the state home department and I don’t want to comment on it.”

The leader of the Opposition, Surjya Kanta Mishra, said the Commissioner had been made a “scapegoat.”

“The government and Trinamul made him a scapegoat, like some other senior police officials who had faced similar actions in the recent past. It was at the local minister’s instructions that Trinamul cadres attacked us,” he said here.

Mishra also alleged that a section of Trinamul leaders had planned to set afire Anil Biswas Bhawan, the Darjeeling district CPM office, during the clash on April 10.

Siliguri top cop shunted out 

TNN | Apr 20, 2013, SILIGURI: The commissioner of Siliguri police, Anand Kumar, was removed from his post on Friday, reportedly for refusing to bow to political pressure. 

There was no official word on the reason behind the transfer but sources said there had been pressure on Kumar to arrest senior CPM leaders Ashok Bhattacharya and Jibesh Sarkar under stringent sections of the law after the violence in Siliguri on April 10 but he resisted the pressure. 

The transfer, said the sources, could be for "disobeying" his political bosses. 

K Jairaman, the deputy inspector general of the state anti-corruption wing, has been appointed the new commissioner of Siliguri. 

Kumar has been posted as the DIG training Barrackpore. Sources hinted that for long, an influential minister based in Siliguri had been pressuring the police to teach CPM leaders a lesson and, following the clash in Siliguri, he had instructed Kumar to book Bhattacharya and other senior CPM leaders for rioting and attempt to murder. But the Siliguri police refused to do, as police had no proper evidence to charge the leaders. 

They arrested SFI members involved in the clash. This "inaction" irked Trinamool leaders who openly started criticizing Kumar. Even North Bengal development minister Gautam Deb alleged police inaction. Also on on Friday, the leader of the Opposition in the Assembly, Surjya Kanta Mishra, held Deb responsible for the CPM-TMC clash. 

Speaking at the CPM office in Siliguri on Friday, Mishra said the government should have removed Deb from his post after the clash. He was answering a question on the removal of the Siliguri police commissioner. 

"Actually, the minister responsible for the clash should have been removed. But that is not being done. There are several instances when a minister was removed after he failed to perform the duty entrusted to him. But here nothing is being done," he said. 

Mishra said the government was increasingly losing touch with the common people and that is why they did not want panchayat elections at the moment.

"It is due to their increasing distance with the common people that they do not want democracy in the state," he said. He claimed that the ruling party was using the police to victimise CPM workers across the state. 

In Siliguri although all the 48 persons arrested in connection to the clash on April 10 got bail on Tuesday, one Babu Lama of Salugara was not granted bail as he has been charged with mobile theft. 

"This is a burning example that the ruling party is using police to victimise our men. Babu Lama has been falsely charged with mobile theft," he said. 

Mishra on Friday visited Babu Lama's house at Salugara in Siliguri. He also met Babu at the Siliguri correctional home. Mishra also met Santosh Sahani at North Bengal Medical College and Hospital where he is admitted. 

A SFI activist, Sahani was shackled in chains with the bed at NBMCH on the ground that the jail did not have requisite police personnel to guard him when he are admitted in NBMCH. In another development, as an aftermath of the clash between TMC and CPM cadres on April 10, the commissioner of police, Siliguri, Anand Kumar has been removed and After Damayanti Sen and RK Pachnanda, police commissioner of Siliguri city police faced the same fate for 'disobeying' political bosses. 

Sources said that Anand Kumar, CP, Siliguri has been removed as he did not act according to the instructions of ruling party. 

On Friday, Kumar has been replaced by K Jayaraman, who was deputy inspector general of state anti-corruption wing. Kumar has been shunted as DIG training Barrackpore. Earlier Damayanti Sen was also shunted as DIG Training following the Park Street rape case row, where CM commented that the rape story was cooked up. Sen however refused to accept it and proved that the lady was really raped, by arresting three prime accused. 

He did not agree to arrest senior CPM leaders like Ashok Bhattacharya and Jibesh Sarkar under stringent sections of law, what a section of north Bengal Trinamool congress was insisting.