In January this year, PM Narendra Modi's convoy was stranded on a flyover due to a blockade by protesters in Ferozepur after which he returned from Punjab without attending any event, including a planned rally. (PTI)A second generation police officer, Harmandeep Singh Hans, carried the image of a tough law enforcer while serving as superintendent of police in Mohali, his home town.
In October 2021, he was promoted and posted as the senior superintendent of police, Ferozepur, by then then Congress government led by Charanjit Singh Channi. Three months down the line, he faced one of the toughest tests of his career — Hans was tasked with ensuring a glitch-free stay of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Ferozepur during his visit to Hussainiwala, near Indo-Pak border, where he was to pay tributes at the Mational Martyr’s Memorial on January 5.
However, the PM’s convoy was stranded on a flyover due to a blockade by protesters in Ferozepur after which he returned from Punjab without attending any event, including a planned rally. Amid a war of words over the security breach between Punjab and the central government, Hans was on January 8 transferred as Commandant 3rd IRB Batallion, Ludhiana.
On Thursday, a report by five-member committee appointed by the Supreme Court to probe the security breach during PM’s visit, said, “Ferozepur SSP failed to discharge his responsibility to maintain law and order or take steps to deploy forces to secure the route despite knowledge that there were large hostile groups on the route. He failed to do this even though sufficient force was available and even though he was informed two hours before that the Prime Minister will enter that route”.
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That day, farmers under the banner of BKU Krantikari and Kisan Mazdoor Sangrash Committee, had blocked Piareana bridge about 2 km away from the PM’s rally venue. When PM’s cavalcade reached the bridge, farmers refused to make way. At that time Baldev Singh Zira, general secretary, BKU Krantikari, had said that the SSP had told them that PM will be going to Hussainiwala via road, but they considered it as a bluff to get the dharna lifted.
Later, farmers were booked but no action has been taken against them till date.
Hans, who now finds himself in the news for all the wrong reasons, had hit the headlines as SP Investigation (Mohali) in January 2020 for seizing a consignment of 3.5 kg heroin worth Rs 18 crore. A Nigerian along with six others were arrested.
He and his team had also exposed an online fraud racket.
The 33-year-old officer, after completing his schooling from Gian Jyoti Public School, Mohali had secured a degree in mechanical engineering from Chandigarh College of Engineering and Technology. He cleared the PCS exam in 2014, but took the civil services exam conducted by UPSC in 2015, secured all India rank 101. At that time, his father Varinder Singh, a PPS officer, was serving as DSP.