Bengal IPS officer reports for duty at Home Ministry

New Delhi: West Bengal IPS officer Rajeev Kumar on Thursday reported for duty at the Union Home Ministry, over two hours later than the time set by Election Commission which had relieved him from his post as the state's ADG, CID following violence in Kolkata.

Sources said that Rajeev Kumar reported to the officer concerned in the Ministry between 12 noon and 1 p.m., and then left.

The 1989 batch IPS officer, who has been Kolkata Police Commissioner between May 2016 and February 2019, reported to the ministry soon after arriving in the capital around 11.30 a.m.

The source said that Kumar missed his 10 a.m reporting time at the Home Ministry as he was waiting for his relieving order from West Bengal government.

The EC had on Wednesday relieved Rajeev Kumar from his post with immediate effect ordering him to report for duty in the Home Ministry at 10 a.m. on Thursday.

He had earlier been questioned by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in connection with the multi-crore Saradha chit fund scam.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had in February staged a 70-hour dharna after the CBI made a bid to question Kumar at his residence in Kolkata, which was thwarted by the local police. The CBI later had to approach the Supreme Court to make the questioning possible.

The Commission had also removed with immediate effect the West Bengal's Principal Secretary, Home, Atri Bhattacharya for "having interfered" in the poll process and curtailed the poll campaign in the state by a day, ordering stoppage of electioneering from 10 p.m. on Thursday on the remaining nine Lok Sabha constituencies going to the polls on May 19.

The EC took the decision, as it invoked - for the first time - Article 324 of the Constitution which gives it special powers to control and give directions for holding elections.

The decisions the EC took "as an action on violence in West Bengal on Tuesday during a road show conducted by BJP President Amit Shah. The violence had also led vandalisation of Bengali polymath Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar's statue.