Bengal cops transferred: EC rejects Mamata's charge of bias

NEW DELHI: Election Commission has written back to West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee rejecting allegations of bias levelled by her in wake of the poll body transferring four senior police officers of the state including Kolkata police commissioner Anuj Sharma.

The Commission, in a letter sent to her on Saturday evening, is learnt to have rejected her charge saying that EC has always taken decisions in the interest of free and fair polls and does not need to prove its credentials in this regard.

Banerjee, in a letter sent to EC, had accused the poll panel of unfairly following the BJP-led Central government’s orders.

She reportedly described the poll body’s decision to shift out police officials as unfortunate, “highly arbitrary, motivated and biased”, and demanded that it reconsider the order. “Should there be any deterioration in the law order situation of the state, would the Commission take responsibility?” a PTI report said quoting from the letter.

The chief minister also asked the poll panel to find out who had ordered the transfer of the police officials. Banerjee claimed that the officials were told about their transfer soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and a BJP candidate claimed that the law and order situation was deteriorating in West Bengal.

Earlier on Saturday, Banerjee, at a rally in Kachini in north Bengal, claimed the police officers were transferred at the behest of the BJP. “If the BJP thinks that by transferring my officers they would make me weak, they are mistaken,” she was quoted as saying by media reports.

On Friday, EC had replaced Anuj Sharma with Rajesh Kumar, who was the additional director general of police, Pollution Control Board.

Sharma was appointed Kolkata police chief in February, taking over from Rajeev Kumar who was transferred to the Crime Investigation Department. The Central Bureau of Investigation had interrogated Rajeev Kumar in connection with the Saradha chit fund scam in February.

The poll body had also appointed Natarajan Ramesh Babu as commissioner of Bidhannagar Police, replacing Gyanwant Singh. The BJP had lodged a complaint with the EC against Singh alleging police interference when Trinamool Congress MP Abhishek Banerjee’s wife was reportedly found carrying gold at the Kolkata airport.