Prove your worth or face consequences: DGP to Patna police

PATNA: Patna police are on their toes after director general of police (DGP) Gupteshwar Pandey gave them a dressing down on Sunday.
Peeved at police’s “failure to contain the rising incidents of crime”, especially murder, daylight robbery and cash loot, the DGP paid a surprise visit to the office of Patna senior superintendent of police (SSP) Garima Malik on Sunday midnight and held an unscheduled meeting with the officials.
Pandey, who assumed charge almost four months ago, expressed concern over a spurt in the incidents of crime. He inquired about the progress in the investigation of the case related to attack on a jewellery shop in Danapur and loot of Rs 60 lakh from an employee of an Alamganj cement dealer.
The state police chief also expressed displeasure over callousness of the investigating officers to dispose of the special reported (SR) cases which are still pending. The issues related to non-execution of arrest warrants and property attachment orders were also discussed at the meeting, which was attended by ADG (law & order) Amit Kumar and IG (Patna zone) Sunil Kumar, among others.
The DGP stressed the need to assess the performance of the sub-divisional officers (SDPO) and the deputy superintendents of police (DSP) by the members of the special DG team at the police headquarters. “Prove your worth or be ready to face the consequences,” the DGP told the officials present at the meet, which lasted for more than two hours.
ADG (law & order) Amit Kumar told this newspaper on Monday, “There was nothing unusual. Such meetings are held periodically to assess the law and order situation. As most of us are busy during daytime, the meeting was convened at night.”
Kumar, however, pointed out that instructions were issued to the police officials to improve the standard of investigation and increase the reporting time to the site of occurrence. “Being the supervisory officials, we have certain responsibilities and we simply follow the rule book,” he said.
A senior police officer, who was present at the meeting, said on the condition of anonymity that the station house officers (SHO) and the SDPOs were asked to mend their ways, failing which strong disciplinary action would be taken against them. “The SHOs were given a time frame to improve the law and order situation in areas falling under their respective police stations,” he added.
This is the second time when a DG-rank officer has visited the SSP office to assess the law and order situation. Earlier, Pandey’s predecessor K S Dwivedi had held a meeting with the senior officials of the state capital and warned them of stern disciplinary action for their failure to rein in the anti-social elements.
Soon after assuming charge, Pandey had carried out surprise inspections at several police stations in Vaishali, Muzaffarpur and Bhojpur districts and cautioned the cops for being lax on duty. “He is doing the same thing, which he used to do during his tenure as SP in the districts,” recalled an ASP-rank officer, who was earlier posted in Nalanda.