Lucknow, Mar 31 (PTI) The Samajwadi Party (SP) has demanded that the Election Commission remove IAS officer Anjaneya Kumar Singh as the Moradabad divisional commissioner to ensure a “free and fair” by-election to the Swar Assembly seat, scheduled for May 10.
In a letter to the Uttar Pradesh Chief Electoral Officer, SP state president Naresh Uttam alleged that the officer acted like “a BJP worker during the Assembly election last year”.
The SP state president said the credibility of the Election Commission is being questioned due to the non-removal of Singh from the post despite several complaints against him.
A 2005-batch IAS officer of Sikkim cadre, Singh had come to Uttar Pradesh on deputation under the Samajwadi Party government in February of 2015.
He was made the district magistrate of Rampur in February of 2019 by the Yogi Adityanath-led government. He served as the district magistrate there till March of 2021 when he was promoted as the divisional commissioner of Moradabad. Rampur district falls under the Moradabad division.
The officer is widely believed to have tightened the noose around Azam Khan and his family who held sway over Rampur for a long time.
It was widely reported in the media that during the 2019 parliamentary elections, Azam Khan had asked his supporters not to be scared of the officer and had even said that he would get his shoes cleaned by the officer after the elections.
The by-election to the Swar Assembly seat was necessitated following the disqualification of Abdullah Azam Khan, the son of senior Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan, after he was sentenced two years’ imprisonment by a court for illegally blocking the highway and staging a sit-in in January 2008.
Azam Khan also lost his membership of the Assembly after he was sentenced to two-year imprisonment by a Rampur court in a hate speech case. Azam Khan won the Rampur Sadar Assembly seat in 2022. PTI CDN SNS SMN
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