(From top) Former Patna city (central) superintendent of police Shivdeep Lande, east superintendent of police Kim and former west superintendent of police Upendra Sharma

Patna, Jan. 4: From one, the number of Indian Police Service (IPS) officers in the state capital went up to three last year. Now, it is back to “square one”.

All of a sudden, two IPS officers in the form of city superintendents of police (SPs) were posted in the state capital last year besides the senior superintendent of police (SSP). The city had last witnessed that six years ago.

With the reigns of the policing of Patna going into the hands of SSP Alok Kumar and city SP Shivdeep Lande in February last year, things had started boiling up with stark examples of a rift between the two officers coming to the fore more than once.

On August 2 last year, the state government brought in two IPS officers in the form of city SP (west) and city SP (east). The move, sources said, was aimed at clipping the wings of Lande, who had become popular among masses.

The official version was simple. With 3,880 pending cases till last year, the need of more IPS officers was eminent, senior police officers felt.

But the transfers of Lande to Araria on November 22 and of Upendra Sharma, the Patna city SP (west), to Jamui last evening, sources said, was least aimed at improving the law and order state of the city. They were more about pressure from the influential class, who twisted the state government according to their whims and fancies.

“The police headquarters does not transfer or post any IPS officer. The decisions are made by the state government. In Patna, there are posts sanctioned for Patna City SP west, east and central. Last year, when Kim was made the SP (east), Sharma was made the SP (west) and Lande was made the SP (central). The excuse was 3,880 pending cases in the capital compared to an average of around 600 pending cases in other districts. Senior police officers said on an average around 350 specially reported (SR) cases were reported each month in Patna. SR cases require an IPS officers’ attention. The average figure of SR cases in other districts stands between 50 and 60. In such a scenario, the need for more IPS officers was inevitable and the posts were filled up. But if the same is the state, why didn’t the state government fill up the vacant posts once Lande or Sharma was transferred? Does the state government want to say everything is fine now?” K.K. Jha, the general secretary of the Bihar Police Association told The Telegraph.

However, it is just not only about the vacant posts of SPs in the Patna police. The mysterious silence maintained by the state government on the appointment of new deputy inspector-general (DIG) of central range (Patna) is also a cause of concern.

The post of the central range DIG has been vacant since Vineet Vinayak, a 1995-batch IPS officer, was relieved for his parent cadre, Sikkim, on December 13 last year.

Patna and Nalanda come under the jurisdiction of the DIG, central range. The post is vacant for about three weeks in spite of a spurt in crime. Sources in the state police headquarters said the post has been kept vacant for a high profile IPS officer, who is likely to be promoted in the rank of DIG.