What’s the controversy around Maharashtra DGP Rashmi Shukla, transferred by EC just before polls

This comes after Congress requested her removal alleging 'bias'. Maharashtra's 1st woman DGP, the 1988 batch IPS officer was accused in a phone-tapping case involving MVA leaders.

File photo of Rashmi Shukla | Photo: ANI

Mumbai: The Election Commission of India (ECI) Monday ordered the immediate transfer of Maharashtra Director General of Police (DGP) Rashmi Shukla and instructed the Maharashtra chief secretary to hand over her responsibilities to the next senior-most IPS officer in the cadre.

Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar had previously advised officials, both during review meetings and the assembly election announcement, to be impartial and fair, and emphasised that they should also ensure their conduct is perceived as non-partisan in carrying out their duties.

This comes mere days after Congress state chief Nana Patole requested the ECI to remove DGP Shukla from her post ahead of the 20 November assembly polls. The Congress is part of the opposition alliance Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) in the state, along with Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) and Sharad Pawar-led NCP.

In his 31 October letter to the poll body, Patole had alleged that Shukla is a controversial officer who had sided with the BJP, arguing that her continued presence in office could cast doubts on the fairness and transparency of the upcoming polls.

“Shukla has allegedly instructed police commissioners and district police officers to file cases against opposition leaders and harass them. The police machinery is reportedly obstructing opposition leaders and workers, pressuring and threatening them. Rashmi Shukla’s approach has been controversial in the past, as she was involved in the phone tapping of opposition leaders and has had cases registered against her,” Patole said in the letter.

Shukla became Maharashtra’s first woman DGP in January 2024 but the 1988 batch IPS officer was previously embroiled in controversy during the MVA government’s tenure, when she was accused in a phone-tapping case involving MVA leaders.

‘A brash but good administrator’

In 2021, speaking to ThePrint, a senior retired IPS officer who had worked with Shukla had said that Shukla is not “sophisticated” and that she had worked her way up the ladder without a godfather.

“She is not a greatly sophisticated officer. She comes from a simple lower middle class semi urban background. She hasn’t had pedigree education. She has done all kinds of postings—staff, field. She was treated roughly, and has moved up on her own merit without any godfather,” the retired officer had said. “If she had any political leanings, they were never seen in her work or conduct.”

Shukla is from Uttar Pradesh and was married much before she entered the service. Her husband, late Uday Shukla, was also an IPS officer posted with the Railway Protection Force.

Another officer who was Shukla’s subordinate while she was the Commissioner of Police (CP), Pune, said, “She was brash in her demeanour, but overall a very good administrator. She had a great relationship with all her juniors, right from the joint CPs to the inspectors. She had a good crime branch team as well and we had a strong detection rate during her tenure.”

Shukla is known for being only the second woman police chief of Pune after IPS officer Meera Borwankar. It was during Shukla’s tenure as Pune CP that the police started the Elgar Parishad probe, which ultimately led to the arrest of several lawyers and activists alleged to have Maoist links.

Shukla is said to have been sidelined by the MVA government when she was transferred out of the office of the Commissioner, CID, to the civil defence wing in early 2020. In February 2021, she went on central deputation as additional director general of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF).

Before the MVA government fell in 2022 June, in April, Mumbai Police had filed a chargesheet of around 700 pages against Shukla in the phone tapping case.

Pune Police had also registered a case against her.

What the phone tapping case was about

Officials from the MVA government had, in 2021, said that “misrepresentation” of a request by Shukla to tap phones over an alleged transfer racket had raised suspicions of mischief.

The BJP had slammed the MVA government’s reading of the Telegraph Act as inaccurate.

Senior officials from the MVA government had, at the time, told ThePrint that the emergence of a network of brokers for IPS postings and transfers could have been investigated using regular methods of the police and did not require phone tapping, which is meant for exceptional circumstances.

“In February last year (i.e. 2020), there was a lot of talk about suspicions of phones being tapped for political rivalries and there was a demand for an inquiry within the government, but nothing happened later. Instead, the state home department tightened its systems in place to grant permission for phone tapping. We started making officers submit a written request in more detail,” an official from the home department, who spoke to ThePrint for a report in 2021, had said.

Shukla’s written request had sought permission for intercepting phone conversations citing a threat to public order.

“Only in her report she said she was looking into the emergence of a network of agents for police transfers. She and the state DGP should have inquired by other means, not by phone tapping. The report, too, was sketchy. Everything put together raised suspicions of mischief,” the official had said, adding that the government did not intend to stall the investigation but was of the opinion that the 35-odd IPS officers listed in Shukla’s report did not require an inquiry by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), which she headed.

Shukla’s report, which the state government claims to be “top secret”, was submitted to the then Thackeray-led government, in August 2020. Devendra Fadnavis, then Opposition leader, shared its findings with the media, alleging the state government’s inaction on corruption in IPS transfers and postings that involved senior politicians and high-ranking officials.

The controversy kicked up a storm within the MVA with ministers alleging Shukla to be an “agent of the BJP” and having illegally tapped phones.

In March 2021, CM Thackeray had asked then Maharashtra Chief Secretary Sitaram Kunte to submit a report on the phone tapping within 24 hours. According to Kunte’s submission, Shukla misled the government to obtain permission for surveillance.

Kunte contended that according to the Indian Telegraph Act, permission to intercept telephone conversations can only be obtained in cases involving national security, seditious acts or cases involving public danger.

Fadnavis had slammed this report.

“Sitaram Kunte is a straight person. I don’t think he will prepare such a report. It looks like Jitendra Awhad or Nawab Malik would have prepared the report and Kunte merely signed off on it. You can see so many inaccuracies in this report. It says that phones can be tapped only in cases related to national security. That is wrong. Phones can be tapped if there is any possibility of incitement of commission of offence,” he said.

Section 5(2) of the Act includes incitement to the commission of an offence as one of the reasons permissible to intercept telephonic conversations.

At the time of reporting this story, a former Mumbai Police chief told ThePrint that transfer rackets involving brokers was an open secret within the force and a complaint regarding it had once come up on the state government’s ‘Aaple Sarkar’ portal, where the public can register their complaints and requests with the state government.

“As intelligence chief, Shukla was merely discharging her duty by inquiring into it and submitting a report to the government. I was surprised at the chief secretary’s report. The Mumbai Police has used this the most to deal with the underworld, which was organised crime,” the officer had said. “The state government should have ordered an inquiry instead of the chief secretary directly giving a report that Shukla misled him.”

Kunte had, at the time, defended his stand. “A plain reading of the Act is not sufficient. It has to be seen in context of Supreme Court rulings on right to privacy. Interception of telephonic conversations should be used very sparingly,” he said.