Patna, Aug. 24: Abhayanand is set to replace Neel Mani as Bihar’s director-general of police. The 1977 batch IPS officer already empanelled in the DG rank would take over his new assignment after the present incumbent retires on August 31.

Sources said the chief minister, Nitish Kumar, today cleared the name of Abhayanand from the panel of three officers. The others in the panel included Manoje Nath and A.K. Gupta. Abhayanand has superseded Nath of 1973 batch. Gupta is also from 1977 batch.

“I suggest the cops first to become a good man to become a good policemen,” Abhayanand told The Telegraph in his first message to the police cadre.

Abhayanand, who served as the additional director-general of police (ADG), headquarters, for almost three years after the Nitish Kumar government came to power for the first time in 2005, was the brain behind the “speedy trial”. The initiative put numerous ganglords behind the bars, ensuring their conviction. It helped establishing better law and order situation in the state.

It is believed that relative deterioration in the law and order situation of late in comparison to his previous tenure compelled the chief minister to fall back on Abhayanand who was also credited with taming the Jungle Party — an outfit of criminals troubling people in West Champaran in the 1980s.

Known as a tough cop, Abhayanand is known for his penchant for teaching. He has coached many IIT aspirants.

A postgraduate in physics, he voluntarily teaches the subject to the IIT aspirants. He was also the co-founder of the Super 30, a coaching institute which voluntarily teaches the poor IIT students, with Anand.

The IPS officer parted ways with Anand three years ago. Since then, he has been separately helping the poor students from the Muslim community in realising their ambition to get into the premier engineering institutions of the country.