Mumbai Police Commissioner Hemant Nagrale issued a circular this week warning his personnel that disciplinary action shall be taken against any anyone who bypasses him and approaches the DG or any other unit head seeking a transfer.
The move comes in the backdrop of an incident in which 12 senior police officers had bypassed the then Mumbai police commissioner Sanjay Barve in 2019 and submitted transfer applications directly to the then Maharashtra Director General of Police (DGP) Subodh Jaiswal seeking transfer to the Maharashtra ATS, which was then headed by Deven Bharti. Subsequently, Barve had issued show cause notices to 12 decorated police officers asking them for a written explanation as to why he should not take disciplinary action against them.
The order by Nagrale comes after a number of officers in the force had again written to the DG office or heads of other units like Thane or Navi Mumbai commissioner seeking a transfer bypassing the Mumbai CP.
“It has come to our notice, that police officers and constables from Mumbai police have approached the senior officials and head of other units and submitted their application for transfer while they also go and attend war rooms. In regards to such an application, the officials are not going through a proper channel i.e. through their superiors and also the remarks of Mumbai police commissioner are not being taken,” the circular issued on Tuesday said.
According to police officials, every policeman has to follow a due procedure, according to which an officer has to submit a request of transfer to another unit to the chief of the unit they are serving in, which in this case is the Mumbai Police Commissioner, who then decides after taking into account the population of Mumbai city, the nature of work, vacant posts of the police, and the increasing duties and responsibilities. Officials said that by bypassing the laid down chain of command, the personnel were violating rules.
The commissioner through the circular warned that disciplinary action will be taken against the policeman found violating the order.