Meenu Kumari. Picture by Ashok Sinha

Patna, Feb. 21: After a gap of over three decades, Bihar has got a daughter of the soil as an IPS officer to monitor crime in the state.

Meenu Kumari, a resident of Purnea, is among the eight IPS officers of the 2010 batch who have been allotted the Bihar cadre. She is the first woman from the state to get a Bihar cadre in the IPS after Kumud Choudhary (1979 batch) and Manjari Jaruhar (1976 batch).

While both Choudhary and Jaruhar, said to be residents of Patna, were allotted Jharkhand cadre after the bifurcation of Bihar in 2000, Meenu will be the lone Bihari woman IPS officer to serve the state. Meenu, daughter of a teacher, is a postgraduate in history.

“After three decades, a female resident of Bihar has joined as an IPS officer. Though several women have been allotted the Bihar cadre and are serving the state, they hailed from other states,” said a senior IPS officer posted at the police headquarters here.

For instance, Kim, the city superintendent of police, Patna, and a 2008 batch officer, is a domicile of Uttar Pradesh.

Meenu has been asked to join as assistant superintendent of police (under training) in Sitamarhi.

Sources in the headquarters said out of eight IPS officers allotted the Bihar cadre, two are residents of Bihar while three are from Uttar Pradesh and one each from Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh.

Dhurat Saayli Savla Ram, a native of Mumbai in Maharashtra, is another woman IPS officer of the 2010 batch who has been allotted the Bihar cadre. She has been posted at Katihar for field training.

Deepak Burnawal and Rajiv Misra, both residents of Pratapgarh in UP, have been allotted Banka and Munger districts for six-and-a-half month field training.

Himanshu Shankar Trivedi, a native of Rai Bareli in UP, has been allotted Aurangabad. Chandan Kumar Kushwaha, a resident of Bhagalpur in Bihar, has been posted at Bettiah whereas Hari Prasath S., a native of Koyampattur in Tamil Nadu, has been allotted Rohtas for training.

Sudhir Kumar Porika, a resident of Varangal in Andhra Pradesh, has been notified to join at Kishanganj for training.

During the six-and-a-half month training, the officers would work as station house officers, investigating officers, circle inspectors, deputy superintendents of police and sergeant majors.

At present, Bihar has a sanctioned strength of 231 IPS officers. “The Centre has increased the quota of the IPS officers in the recent past. As a result, more and more newly appointed IPS officers are allotted the Bihar cadre. If the ratio continues for another four-five years, there will be no shortfall of officers in the IPS-rank in Bihar,” a senior police officer said.