The Maharashtra government on Thursday appointed 1988 batch Indian Police Service (IPS) officer Rashmi Shukla as the Director General of Police. Ms. Shukla became the first woman police officer to hold the top police post in the State.
She takes over from another 1988 IPS batch officer Rajnish Seth, who retired last week to take charge as chairman of the Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC). Mumbai police commissioner Vivek Phansalkar has been holding additional charge as Maharashtra DGP Maharashtra since Mr. Seth retired on December 31.
Ms. Shukla was on Central deputation heading the Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) – the border guarding force, before her latest appointment as Maharashtra DGP. Prior to this, she was appointed as Additional Director-General of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in February 2021.
However, it was during her tenure as Commissioner of the State Intelligence Department (SID) during the Devendra Fadnavis-led Bharatiya Janata Party government that she courted controversy after being accused of secretly tapping phones of leaders of the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) coalition, including Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) leader Sanjay Raut, Maharashtra Congress chief Nana Patole and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Eknath Khadse.
After the Uddhav Thackeray-led MVA came to power in late 2019, three FIRs were lodged alleging that calls of MVA leaders were being intercepted illegally and that data from the SID headed by Ms. Shukla was allegedly being leaked to Mr. Fadnavis, who was the then Leader of Opposition. Ms. Shukla was named accused in two of the three cases.
In March 2021, current Deputy CM and Home Minister Mr. Fadnavis, then the Opposition Leader, had claimed in a press conference that he had proof of massive lobbying for plum postings being done senior police officials with MVA leaders.
Mr. Fadnavis had said he had a large data of call records and the names of those involved and that he was handing it to the Union Home Secretary for further action.
Mr. Fadnavis’ reference was to a draft report on the lobbying affair written by Ms. Shukla, which led MVA leaders to question how the BJP leader managed to access confidential material and communication that was meant to be secret.
Since then, Ms. Shukla was at loggerheads with the then MVA government, which perceived her as having been close to the Fadnavis-led BJP government. It had immediately transferred her from her post as chief of the SID to Civil Defence, seen as a non-executive post.
However, the senior police officer’s fortunes turned after the Thackeray-led MVA government collapsed in June 2022 and the Eknath Shinde-led ‘Mahayuti’ (comprising of the BJP, the Shinde-led Shiv Sena and later, Ajit Pawar’s NCP) came to power in the State.
Since the regime change, speculation has been rife about Ms. Shukla returning back to the State to occupy the top police post.
In September, the Bombay High Court has quashed two cases lodged against Ms. Shukla, one filed in Pune and the other in Mumbai pertaining to the illegal phone tapping affair. The third case was transferred to the CBI, but this case, too, was closed after the court allowed the CBI’s closure report.
While Ms. Shukla is due to retire at the end of June, the State government can give her an extension.
Born in August 1965, Ms. Shukla hails from Mumbai. Her husband Uday Shukla, also from the IPS, officer had passed away aged 58 while undergoing treatment for oesophageal cancer in Pune. At the time, Ms. Rashmi Shukla had been posted as Pune Commissioner of Police.
