Delhi Police chief Sanjay Arora to retire on July 31
Arora, who is a 1988-batch IPS officer from the Tamil Nadu cadre, took charge of the Police Commissioner's office in August 2022.
With Arora's retirement confirmed, police sources said that a call on his successor will be taken later. Director General of Prisons Satish Golcha (1992-batch IPS AGMUT cadre) and CISF Special Director General Praveen Ranjan (1993-batch IPS AGMUT cadre) are among the other senior officers in the force.
However, sources have pointed out that the last two Police Commissioners, including Arora, have not been from the Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram and Union Territory (AGMUT) cadre. The previous commissioner, Rakesh Asthana, was from the Gujarat cadre.
Police Commissioner Arora's career has spanned over four decades.
During his time in the Tamil Nadu Police, he was the Superintendent of Police (SP) of the Special Task Force and carried out operations against forest brigand Veerappan in the sandalwood forests of the state.
In 2004, the sandalwood smuggler was killed in a shootout by Arora's team, which was led by famed IPS officer K Vijay Kumar. Arora would earn the CM's Gallantry Medal for Bravery and Heroic Action for his role.
His work in Tamil Nadu would also earn him a Police Medal for meritorious service in 2004.
Ten years later, he would be awarded the President's Police Medal for distinguished service. He was also part of the United Nations Peacekeeping Mission in Kosovo, for which he earned a UN Peacekeeping medal.
He went on to serve as the Director General of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police and the Director General of the Sashastra Seema Bal from 2021 to 2022.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Print
3 hours ago
- The Print
RTI activist sought details of govt tenders. Haryana govt buried him under 37,443 pages
What he received in return was a staggering 37,443 pages of documents, weighing over 108 kilograms, after submitting a cheque and demand draft to pay a hefty Rs 80,000 in fees. Pankaj Arora, a local book depot owner filed a Right to Information (RTI) application with the Public Health Engineering Department (PHED), seeking details of tenders, staffing, and expenditure. He now virtually finds himself buried under a mountain of papers! Gurugram: In a bizarre case in Haryana's Kurukshetra, an RTI activist's pursuit of transparency has turned into a paperchase—quite literally. Yet, Arora claims, the response is incomplete, with thousands of irrelevant pages dumped to obscure alleged irregularities. He also said, the banks informed him, the department has failed to encash the cheque and demand draft. Also Read: This Haryana information commissioner is striking terror in the hearts of govt officers A mountain of paper, but little clarity On 30 January 2025, Arora, who runs Mehar Book Depot in Sector 13, filed an RTI application with 15 pointed queries. He sought details of tenders issued by the PHED between January 2023 and January 2025, contractor licences, employee records under the Haryana Kaushal Rozgar Yojana, GST payments, and departmental expenditure, among others. His aim: to uncover what he alleges are financial and procedural irregularities in the PHED. The department's response, however, was anything but straightforward. On 3 February, Arora received two letters from the Executive Engineer (XEN). One instructed subordinates to calculate the number of pages and fees, while the other demanded Rs 85,000 for rendering him the information. 'They sent two letters on the same day, contradicting each other. It felt like a deliberate attempt to confuse,' Arora told ThePrint. The fee was later reduced to Rs 80,000. Arora sent a demand draft for Rs 10,000 and a cheque for Rs 70,000. But, the department delayed the response for months. It was only after Arora escalated the matter to the governor, chief minister, chief secretary and Kurukshetra's deputy commissioner (DC) that the PHED acted. On 6 June, following the DC's intervention, the department dispatched a quintal of documents—37,443 pages—to Arora's doorstep, through one of its employees. Arora alleged the response is a classic case of information overload meant to obfuscate. 'Thousands of pages are irrelevant—copies of contractor agreements and other documents I never asked for,' he said. He claimed the department failed to provide critical details, such as specific tender processes, GST payment records, and audit reports, which were central to his RTI query. 'They're hiding a multi-crore scam in tenders and recruitments,' Arora alleged, adding he has now appealed to the State Information Commission, which has accepted his plea. What adds to the controversy is Arora's claims the Rs 80,000 he sent the cheque and the DD for was never encashed and deposited in the government treasury. 'I paid Rs.10,000 through a demand draft from PNB and Rs 70,000 via a banker's cheque from the Little Millennium School, both in my name. The bank confirmed the funds weren't deposited,' he said. Demand drafts and cheques typically expire after three months, raising questions about the department's handling of the payment. PHED defends its actions Sumit Garg, the Executive Engineer at PHED Kurukshetra, defended the department's response. Speaking to The Print on Sunday, Garg said, 'We provided the information as per the RTI application. Compiling nearly 40,000 pages took significant effort and over two months. The fee was calculated at Rs 2 per page, as per government rules.' Addressing the non-deposited payment, Garg claimed the issue arose because the demand draft and cheque were issued under the name of Mehar Book Depot and Little Millennium School, and not in Arora's name. 'We've asked him to validate the payments,' he added. Garg also dismissed Arora's request for digital records, stating, 'The RTI didn't specifically ask for digital copies.' Arora, however, insists he had requested digital formats to reduce paper use, in line with the government's paperless initiative. 'They ignored my request and sent a quintal of paper to intimidate me.' He also claims this is a record in Haryana—no RTI applicant has ever received such a voluminous response. 'It's a deliberate tactic to discourage activists. They thought I wouldn't pay Rs. 80,000, but I did. Now, they've buried me in useless papers,' he said. The activist has escalated his fight to Chandigarh, where his appeal is pending before the State Information Commission. For now, Arora remains undeterred, vowing to pursue the truth, even if it's buried under a mountain of paper. Also Read: Why UPSC has returned Haryana govt's proposal for promotion of 27 of its officers to IAS
Hindustan Times
2 days ago
- Hindustan Times
Delhi man held for ₹2 crore cyber fraud, links with Chinese-linked syndicate
Gurugram: Faridabad police arrested a 39-year-old Delhi resident, who runs a hotel and nightclub in Dubai, for allegedly orchestrating a ₹2.02 crore cyber fraud in collaboration with a Chinese-linked syndicate, officials said on Friday. Faridabad police arrested a 39-year-old Delhi resident, who runs a hotel and nightclub in Dubai, for a ₹ 2.02 crore cyber fraud. (Getty Images) Bhupesh Arora, originally from Karnal and currently residing in northwest Delhi's Rohini Sector 11, operates a four-star hotel and eight nightclubs in Dubai, police said, adding that he was taken into custody on Wednesday upon returning to India and is now on a four-day police remand. According to investigators, Arora and his business partner, also based in Dubai, ran a cyber fraud operation alongside their hospitality ventures. The duo facilitated illegal fund transfers from India to Dubai using payment gateways, later converting the funds into cryptocurrencies and handing them over to Chinese handlers after deducting a commission. Police said Arora was compelled to return to India 20 days back on the directions of the Punjab and Haryana high court. Faridabad police had got a lookout circular issued for him against which he had moved the high court. Though the court had quashed the circular, it had directed him to come to India and cooperate with the Faridabad police by joining the investigation of the case. Yashpal Yadav, Faridabad Police PRO, said investigators traced Arora through a payment gateway account linked to him, into which ₹2.8 lakh of the duped money was transferred. 'This payment gateway helped us identify Arora. The bank account holder couldn't be traced and may have been created fraudulently,' he said. Arora allegedly retained 30% of the proceeds, with the remaining 70% going to his Dubai-based partner, who liaised directly with the Chinese network, Yadav said. Arora is the 12th person arrested in this case. Police are now pursuing his business partner and three others. 'We will issue an LOC against his partner so he can be arrested on arrival in India,' said Yadav. The victim, whose name police have witheld, a 51-year-old man from Sector 88 in Faridabad, was duped in January 2024 after falling for a fake investment scheme promoted through social media ads. Believing he was investing in stock markets, he transferred ₹2.02 crore to 11 different bank accounts. A case was registered at the Cybercrime Police Station (Central), and police have so far recovered ₹60 lakh, which was returned to the victim. The remaining amount, officers said, had already been siphoned abroad.
New Indian Express
3 days ago
- New Indian Express
Dalit sanitation workers allege caste abuse by Melpathi panchayat president in TN
VILLUPURAM: The Tamil Nadu government has directed the Villupuram SP to inquire into allegations of caste-based discrimination against four Dalit sanitation workers in Melpathi village. The directive from the deputy secretary (Home Department) follows a petition submitted to the chief minister's special cell. G Muniyammal (47), one of the workers, alleged that she and three others were forced to clean human faeces with bare hands and subjected to repeated caste-based abuse by Melpathi panchayat president R Manivel and a few Caste Hindu members. They also accused local police officers of coercing the workers into withdrawing the complaint. The four workers - Muniyammal, K Athilakshmi, S Nagaraj, and P Govindaraj - collect household waste in the village. Following the attack on a Dalit family by the caste Hindus allegedly for entering the Shri Dharmaraja Draupathi Amman Temple on April 7, 2023, the workers said they are being humiliated publicly and unfairly blamed for the temple dispute. The workers stated that the discrimination, verbal abuse, and physical intimidation from the panchayat president has become unbearable over the past two years. 'We were mocked, threatened, and assigned demeaning tasks. We were told not to enter certain streets and they made us feel like we didn't belong here. We were even forced to clean human faeces with bare hands,' Muniyammal told TNIE. 'They even forced us to sign blank papers that were later fabricated to claim that we have withdrawn the complaint.' Despite repeated appeals to panchayat officials, including vice president Selvam, and sanitation supervisor Kavitha, no action has been taken, the workers said in the complaint.
