NEW DELHI: Four days before his retirement as director general of Border Security Force, senior Gujarat cadre IPS officer Rakesh Asthana was on Tuesday appointed as Commissioner of Delhi Police with immediate effect. S S Deswal, director general of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police, will hold additional charge of BSF DG’s post for now, said an order issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs.
Special CP (Vigilance) Balaji Shrivastava, an IPS officer of 1985 batch, has been holding the additional charge of Delhi Police chief since the retirement of SN Shrivastav on June 30.
While clearing Asthana’s appointment, the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet headed by PM Narendra Modi, approved inter-cadre deputation and extended his service for a period of one year from the date of his superannuation on July 31 or until further order. Usually, an officer belonging to the Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram and Union Territory (AGMUT) cadre is made Delhi Police chief.
Asthana’s CBI stint was controversial
How ever, two other officers from non-AGMUT cadre have been appointed to the post in the past. Asthana, who is said to be very close to PM Modi and Amit Shah since the time he was serving in Gujarat, had earlier had a controversial stint as special director of the CBI.
In 2018, he was involved in a public feud with the then CBI director Alok Verma, who opposed his appointment as special director and had registered a case against him for allegedly accepting bribe from pharma company Sterling Biotech that was accused of fraud.
Both the officers were removed from their position. Asthana was named as director general of Bureau of Civil Aviation Security in January 2019. Cleared of the bribery charges in February 2020, he was named as BSF chief in August last year and was also given the additional charge of the NCB head.