Rajeev Kumar, Kolkata’s former top cop, has been replaced by IPS Anuj Sharma as Police Commissioner in the latest order issued by additional secretary of West Bengal police on Tuesday, 19 February.
Kumar has now been posted as Additional Deputy General (ADG) and Inspector General of Police (IGP) in the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of West Bengal.
His replacement Anuj Sharma is currently posted as ADG and IGP (Law and Order) in the Kolkata police force.
Earlier this month, a CBI raid at Rajeev Kumar’s house triggered a row between Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and the Centre. A midnight raid was carried out at Kumar’s residence on 3 February.
The CBI had conducted the raid citing Kumar’s involvement in multi-crore scams.
The raid threw the state in an unprecedented crisis after Banerjee sat on a dharna protesting CBI’s move and accused the Centre of misusing the investigating agency.
Presently under the scanner of Central Bureau of Investigation, Kumar is being questioned in an investigation being carried out in Shillong after an order passed by the Supreme Court on 5 February.
A group of 40 CBI officials allegedly turned up outside the house of the then Kolkata Police Commissioner on 3 February, in connection with the agency’s probe into the Saradha and Rose Valley ponzi scams, and were detained by the local cops.
Kumar was reportedly heading the Special Investigation Team (SIT) that was looking into both of these scams, before the case was transferred to the CBI in 2014 on the Supreme Court’s orders.
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