Gupta Unhappy With Cbi Chief

Union home minister Indrajit Gupta said yesterday that CBI director Joginder Singh was behaving in a subjective manner.

Talking to newsmen here, Gupta said Singh was also being accused of selective leaking of contents of the senstional investigation reports to the press before submitting to the Prime Minister for cabinets approval.

Gupta said I am not happy with the performance of the cbi director.

Expressing dissatisfaction over the functioning of the CBI director, Gupta said though the CBI should function in a most secretive manner, its present director was appearing before the Doordarshan viewers almost everyday.

The heads of CBI, IB and Raw were the three important institutions and the functioning of these agencies should be invisible, Gupta added. He said the Centre was contemplating cutting expenditure on VVIP and VIP security in New Delhi as a huge amount of Rs 58 crore per month was being spent in this regard. He said that about a dozen VIPs like chief ministers and governors of other states visited Delhi for official purposes daily, requiring at least 1,000 men to be deputed to look after security arrangements.

Besides a huge burden on the exchequer, this had led to the increase in the crime rate in the capital as most of the police stations did not have enough policemen to look after the law and order situation satisfactorily, he said.

Gupta said the Centre would soon come out with a revised scheme of personal security arrangement to VVIPs and VIPs.

Though a large number of people were seeking personal security on various grounds, the government could not afford to provide security to all such people as and when they asked, Gupta added. He said the crime rate in mega-cities like Mumbai and Delhi was on the increase and it could be arrested only by maintaining a good relationship with policemen and the public. There were, however, no arrangements in India to build up a good relationship between the public and policemen, he said, adding, that police personnel could not act effectively in the absence of co-operation from the public. Gupta said the Centre was considering taking steps to associate citizens organisations in the day-to-day work of policemen. An autonomous police complaints authority would be set up in New Delhi on an experimental basis to hear the grievances of public against policemen. The authority would consist of peoples representatives, women, social workers and a retired senior police official, chaired by a person with a judicial background, he said.

If it was found successful in redressing the grievances of public against policemen, pcas would be extended to other parts of the country also, he added.