Social activist Nutan Thakur has moved the Election Commission of India (ECI) to get officers close to the ruling party removed to ensure a free and fair polls in UP. The activist and her IPS husband Amitabh Thakur had bitter experiences in the present Samawadi Party regime.
Thakur wrote to the ECI highlighting a list of officers close to the SP hierarchy and sought necessary action against them.
Interestingly, none of the political party has so far submitted names of officers close to the powers-that-be to the ECI urging replacement.
However, the Election Commission is reviewing all postings made by SP government in the last three months from the date of announcement of Assembly poll.
Thakur said that she visited the State Election Office, lucknow and provided a list of two dozen such IAS and IPS officers to UP Chief Electoral Officer, T Venkatesh. She alleged that these officers were working on the insturuction od the SP brass and could adversely affect fair and free elections.
The IAS officers named n the list are retired IAS and State Planning Commission vice-chairman NC Bajpai, ex Chief Secretary and Chief Advisor to CM Alok Ranjan, Chief Secretary Rahul Bhatnagar, Principal Secretary (Appointment) Kishan Singh Atoria, Principal Secretary (Home) Debashish Panda, Principal Secretary to CM Anita Singh, Principal Secretary (Forest and IT etc) Sanjiv Saran, Principal Secretary (Energy) and Chairman (Greater Noida) Sanjay Agrawal, Principal Secretary (Information) Navneet Sahgal and retired IAS officers Housing Secretary S P Singh and Home Secretary S K Raghuvanshi.
Among the IPS officers, the names of DGP S Javeed Ahmad, Vigilance Director Bhanu Pratap Singh, DG (Intelligence) Jawahar lal Tripathi and ADG (law and order) Daljit Singh Chaudhary figure prominently.
Besides making the allegations, Thakur claimed to have given reasons and evidences as to why these officers will not be conducive for fair poll and sought thier removal from their posts for independent elections.