India Today – August 13, 2018

STATES

Mumbai’s new police commissioner.

Interestingly, five major cities—

Mumbai, Thane, Navi Mumbai,

Pune and Nagpur—have new police

commissioners. Back from R&AW,

Subodh Jaiswal already heads

Mumbai Police.

Meanwhile, there is also a view

that the state police was in need

of a shake-up. Fadnavis, also the

home minister, had been taking

a lot of flak over the rising crime

graph. The state eco nomic survey

shows a marked increase in crimes

against women and children.

There were 15,534 crimes against

children in 2017, compared with

13,941 in 2015. During the same

period, crimes against women rose

from 31,126 to 32,100.

The message from the chief

minister , some political observers

say, is clear: show no leniency to

criminals in the run-up to the Lok

Sabha and state assembly polls next

year. One home department official

said the transfers were long overdue.

The CM, he said, was only wait-

ing for ex-state police chief Satish

Mathur, who didn’t agree with him

on a number of postings, to retire.

Opposition leader Radhakrish-

na Vikhe-Patil of the Congress says

the CM “has lost all control over the

[police] department”. But Fadnavis

rejects the charge. “Conviction rates

have gone up from 17 to 44 per cent.

This is a sign of good policing,” he

told the assembly on July 9. n

—Kiran D. Tare

WEST BENGAL

By Romita Datta

MAMATA SEEKS

IMMUNITY

IN SOME QUARTERS,

THE TRANSFERS

ARE BEING SEEN

AS ‘REWARDS’ FOR

FAVOURED OFFICERS

AND ‘PUNISHMENT’

FOR OTHERS

The Lokayukta Bill puts the chief minister

beyond the pale of investigations

T

he West Bengal Lokayukta

Amendment Bill, 2018, as

enacted by the state legis-

lature on July 23, spares

Chief Minister Mamata

Banerjee the scrutiny of the public

watchdog. As per a gazette issued by

the state government, the amend-

ment “excludes any investigation of

any complaint relating to allegation

of corruption against the chief min-

ister relating to public order, and

any investigation of [a] complaint

against a public servant, without

app roval of the state government”.

The original Lokayukta Act,

brought in by the Buddhadeb

Bhattacharjee-led Left Front

government in 2003, had made no

such exemption for chief minis-

ters—though there was a safety net

for them. Complaints of corruption

or abuse of power against the chief

minister, other ministers and public

functionaries required approval

from an ‘appropriate authority’—

two-thirds of the assembly for chief

ministers, and the speaker in case of

ministers. Left leaders are already

up in arms. “It (exemption for the

RISING TIDE A flooded house in Kainakary village, Kuttanad

KOLKATA

RATHEESH.R

16 INDIA TODAY AUGUST 13, 2018