The Bengal government heaved a sigh of relief after the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) directed it on Wednesday to submit a fresh list of IPS officers to the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) by January 23 for shortlisting three names for appointing a new chief of the state police. The state govt acted with alacrity and sent the revised list to the UPSC within hours of the tribunal’s order. Sources in the state home department confirmed it.
The tribunal has also directed the UPSC to convene the empanelment committee meeting by January 28, prepare the panel, and forward it to the state by January 29. It thus clears the decks for the appointment of a new DGP by Jan 31—the day acting DGP Rajeev Kumar retires. It means the state is poised to have a new DGP on February 1.
The Bengal’s DGP post fell vacant more than two years back, on December 28, 2023, and since then, IPS officer Rajeev Kumar (IPS:1989:WB) has been officiating as an acting DGP. The Bengal govt. dilly-dallied in initiating the process for appointment of a regular DGP as per the Supreme Court’s guidelines in the Prakash Singh case of 2006. It resulted in an inordinate delay on the part of the Bengal govt in submitting the DGP empanelment proposal to the UPSC. It was exactly due to this reason that the UPSC recently returned its proposal and directed the state govt to the Supreme Court for further instruction.
The UPSC said that the state government forwarded its proposal only in July 2025, after the lapse of more than one and a half years after the vacancy occurred in Dec 2023.
However, the Bengal govt submitted its panel in July 2025 with a list of 10 IPS officers, including acting DGP Rajeev Kumar. Interestingly, the UPSC also shortlisted three candidates, but the process was stalled after IPS officer Rajesh Kumar (IPS: 1990:WB), currently serving as principal secretary in the department of mass education and library sciences, challenged the selection.
It was Kumar who approached the tribunal seeking to include his name in the UPSC’s panel of three senior-most IPS officers for appointment to the DGP post that paved the way for submission of a fresh list by the Bengal govt.
Kumar, who is also scheduled to retire at the end of January, had argued that any further delay in preparation of the panel would jeoparadise his right to be considered for appointment to the DGP post.
Interestingly, two of Bengal’s senior-most IPS officers—both Rajesh Kumar and Rajeev Kumar—are set to retire on January 31.
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