THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Highlighting the flaws in cadre management, the state is losing out on talented police officers as several of them go on Central deputation, leaving in its wake a huge manpower deficit in the top echelons of law enforcement. Around 21 IPS officers from the Kerala cadre are currently working in various Central forces and agencies outside the state while the IPS officers working in Kerala number less than 80. These include only direct recruits.
With more IPS officers awaiting Central postings — Excise Commissioner Rishiraj Singh (ex-cadre DGP), Police Headquarters IG Dinendra Kashyap and ADGP Nitin Agarwal, who is now the Managing Director of Kerala Police Housing Construction Corporation Ltd — the number of IPS officers serving in the state in expected to go down further.
Rishiraj has been empanelled as Director General and is awaiting appointment to helm any of the Central Police Forces (CPF) while Kashyap too is eyeing a posting in the CBI, which he had served for almost eight years before returning to the parent cadre.Sources said talented officers going on Central deputation in large numbers is tantamount to talent drain.
“If we look at the Kerala IPS cadre list, all the good officers have either left the state or are in the process of doing so. This trend also depicts the state and the police force in a bad light as officers moving out of the state in large numbers gives the impression they are not satisfied here,” said a senior IPS officer.
In organisations like the CBI, deputation is given upto seven years at a stretch, after which the officers are repatriated to their parent cadre.
There is a mandatory cooling off period of three years after which they can again opt for deputation. However, in Central agencies like the Intelligence Bureau (IB) and the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), the deputation can be extended indefinitely. In the case of officers like Kashyap and a few others, they have completed this cooling off period.
In the past also, the drain on talent has proved an issue for the Kerala Police. Arun Kumar Sinha, the most senior officer of the IPS Kerala cadre, has been away on deputation for more than a decade, and is now director of RAW. Another one, Arun Kumar Sinha Jr of the 1987 batch is a director with the Special Protection Group, while Ravada Chandrasekhar of the 1992 batch is a joint director with the IB.
Though Central deputation is one way of gaining experience, the deputation scheme was envisaged to allow the officers to put to use the experience thus gained in their cadre state. However, the overstaying of officers on deputation has become a thorn in the flesh of the Police Department which faces a severe resource crunch of top officers.“The government should take a stand on how to utilise the resources which are at our disposal. There should be some ceiling on the period during which an officer can remain on Central deputation,” said another senior officer.