Delhi top cop's backing of policemen not a first

Bassi had in the past backed senior police officers who were found partying on casinos

Delhi Police commissioner Bhimsain Bassi's defiance of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and standing up for allegedly errant policemen is not a first as far as the top cop is concerned.

Posted as Director General of Police in Goa, Bassi, a 1977 batch Indian Police Service officer, had in the past backed senior police officers who were found partying on casinos. A police inspector had even come under a narcotics scanner.

In November 2009, while defending a group of senior police officers including four superintendents of police, two deputy superintendents and one police inspector for partying onboard an offshore casino, Bassi had likened visiting casinos to visiting temples and churches.

"Offshore casinos are not illegal here. What is the problem with police officers going to offshore casinos when they are not on duty? Many people go to temples, churches, on fishing trips. I cannot do anything about it unless casinos are illegal," Bassi had said.

Bassi's comments came even after the Goa home ministry had summoned him and asked him to initiate an enquiry against the seven officers.

The officers who had been partying onboard the casino and were lustily cheering a female crooner later locked themselves into a bar when they realised that there was a media contingent on a familiarisation trip on the same vessel.

The comment had also triggered a controversy with the opposition as well as the Church taking objection.

In another incident in 2011, Bassi sprung to the defence of police inspector Ashish Shirodkar of the anti-narcotics cell who allegedly had links to the Israeli drug mafia operating in Goa.

Bassi initially refused to act against Shirodkar after his name cropped up in a YouTube.com video where an Israeli drug dealer said the official was working hand-in-glove with him.

Bassi, however, later suspended Shirodkar, who was even arrested along with several other policemen for his links to the drug mafia in Goa.

According to Kejriwal, Bassi has refused to suspend four police officials for accusations ranging from run-ins with Aam Aadmi Party ministers, alleged complicity with a drug ring and being in-charge of a police station when a Danish tourist was raped.

Bassi was posted to Goa in February 2009 and was transferred to Delhi in April 2011.