A native of East Champaran district of Bihar and a 1986-batch Odisha-cadre IPS officer, Abhaya took charge as the new DG of Odisha police here at the State police headquarters on Monday. Prior to it, he was officiating as the Director of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel National Police Academy (NPA) at Hyderabad.
The top cop, who uses only his first name without any surname for all official purposes, took charge from in-charge DGP Satyajit Mohanty.
In an unprecedented midnight change of guards on November 20 this year, the then DGP BK Sharma had been dropped from his post and Mohanty was asked to take charge till Abhaya returned from his Central deputation.
The new DGP shared with the media the priorities he has set for himself. He said his top priority would be to properly carry out the Mo Sarkar initiative of the State Government. Explaining the scheme from police point of view, he said the police force needs to be people-friendly taking immediate action on any public complaint. He also said the State Government’s initiative on 5Ts would be his priority to be implemented in the State police in which he would bring in transformations by leveraging on technology, teamwork and transparency within a timeline. Prevention of offences against weaker sections, especially women, would also be one of his top priorities, he said.
Containing Maoist menace, crushing organised crimes and improving the standard of police investigations to improve the conviction rate are also listed among the top priorities of the new DGP, who has a huge experience of working in several important positions of the State police and on Central deputations for last 30 years.