With ministerial control on Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in Haryana triggering a row, Home Minister Anil Vij on Wednesday said that CID is very important and without it, the Home Department is like a wing without having its eyes and ears.
"As of now according to the existing rules, CID is still with the Home Department", said Vij, adding that "Chief Minister is supreme and can take away or divide any department".
A controversy erupted a few weeks ago when some official websites of the State showed CM Manohar Lal Khattar as the minister in charge of the CID.
The Home Minister reacted sharply to this. Vij said that a mere mention on a website cannot divest him of the CID charge and a process has to be followed for reallocating any department to a minister.
The Government later removed the websites’ content showing the CID among the Chief Minister’s portfolios.
The Chief Minister had sought to play down the row over who was in charge of the CID.
A retired Bureaucrat from Panchkula opined that the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) is an intelligence arm of the State police.
It deals in collection of political and criminal intelligence. Moreover, the Haryana Police Act says that the State police shall have a State intelligence wing for collection, collation, analysis and dissemination of intelligence. The CID, as per the Act, also has a separate State Crime Investigation Wing.
CID as per the Business of the Haryana government (Allocation) Rules-1974 is incorporated as a part of the Home Department.
The functions of security, intelligence including espionage and counter espionage which the State CID also looks after are also under the control of the Home Department.
The business allocation rules only specify home, jails and administration of justice as three separate departments.
Sources said that Chief Minister’s office (CMO) is working on creating new department of CID by separating it from the Home Department.
A draft is being prepared, which can be passed in the Haryana Cabinet meeting and presented in the Legislative Assembly. The CID will be legally separated from the Home Department under this draft. If this happens, the CID will remain with the Chief Minister and it will have nothing to do with the Home Department.
Asked if grounds were being prepared to take away the CID from him, Vij had recently said, “The Chief Minister is supreme. If he wants to divide a department, he can do that. If he wants to take away a department, he can do that. I never raised any objection to this.”Reacting on this issue, the Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar had recently said the CID remained under the Chief Minister’s charge during Bansi Lal and Devi Lal governments.