Additional chief secretary rank IAS officer Alapan Bandopadhyay is the new home secretary of the West Bengal government.
Atri Bhattacharya, who was the state home secretary, had been transferred by the Election Commission through an order on May 15 “for having interfered in the process of conducting election by directing CEO, West Bengal”.
Bhattacharya had written to the EC mentioning the need for local police to accompany the Central force teams on the day of the election on the final phase because of the latter’s lack of knowledge about different areas in the state. In the same letter he had pointed out some of the incidents involving the Central forces in earlier phases of the election.
“You will be aware of the incidents of firing by CAPF (central armed police force) during the polls on May 12. There were five such incidents (at Gopiballavpur, Bishnupur, Moyna, Bhagabanpur and Sabong). In addition, there were reports of CAPF personnel behaving roughly with voters in queue and in fact lathi charging them without apparent justification,” the letter read. This letter had prompted the Election Commission to transfer Bhattacharya.
Interestingly however, the IPS officers transferred by the Election Commission in the run up to the polls were reinstated by the government in an order on Sunday as soon as the model code of conduct was lifted.
However, it is not clear why the home secretary was not appointed in the same post again.
There are speculations that a section of senior bureaucrats feel that it was not a right decision for the home secretary to write the letter to the EC. “It was not a carefully thought out move,” said an officer. Bhattacharya could not be reached for comment.
There are also talks of the chief minister trying to make up for some of her past decisions that made some senior bureaucrats unhappy. Many feel that she had offered prestigious positions to junior IAS and IPS officers though many senior officers were fit for the job.
After her party’s poor performance in the elections, Banerjee is said to be reaching out to several competent and senior officers she had not considered for important positions earlier.
