Chandigarh : The Punjab government on Thursday reinstated inspector general of police-rank officer Paramraj Singh Umranangal, more than five years after his arrest and suspension in the 2015 Behbal Kalan and Kotkapura firing cases in the aftermath of Bargari sacrilege incidents.
According to an order issued by the department of home affairs, Umranangal has been reinstated in compliance with the orders of the Punjab and Haryana high court dated February 2,
2024.
“Paramraj Singh Umranangal, IPS, is hereby reinstated in service with immediate effect as per orders of the Punjab and Haryana high court in CWP No 3087 of 2023,” reads the order by secretary (home) Gurkirat Singh.
Umranangal will report to the office of the director general of police (DGP) for assignment of duties until regular posting orders are issued, the order reads.
The Punjab and Haryana high court had quashed Umranangal’s suspension in February this year but he was not reinstated. In March, he filed a contempt petition in the HC.
However, the government approached the Supreme Court against the high court order but it refused to stay the order in May.
{{/usCountry}}However, the government approached the Supreme Court against the high court order but it refused to stay the order in May.
{{/usCountry}}In the latest application filed before the HC, Umranangal had submitted that even as the SC had refused to interfere with the high court order, he was not being made to join the duties.
While hearing this petition, the court on July 5 said there was no ground with the state government for not allowing Umranangal to resume his work while fixing July 15 as the next date of hearing.
The court had observed that the state couldn’t pick and choose the rules as per their “suitability” and directed that he be allowed to join the services “forthwith”.
Umranangal had argued that the all-India services discipline and appeal rules, 1969, provides that an order of suspension has to be reviewed by the review committee concerned within 60 days from the date of issuance.
Umranangal was the inspector general of police when he was suspended in 2019, a day after his arrest in the police firing cases.
A “blue-eyed” boy of then DGP Sumedh Singh Saini, Umranangal was posted as the commissioner of police, Ludhiana, but he was specially sent to Kotkapura to handle the situation following protests by Sikh organisations there. Several people were injured in Kotkapura clash between police and the protesters whereas two people had died in Behbal Kalan.
The state government had issued three suspension orders — two pertaining to the police firing cases and one related to an FIR in the NDPS case — in February 2019, November 2020 and March 2021.
Umranangal had moved the HC in 2023 after the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) rejected his claim for reinstatement.
Umranangal, a 1995-batch IPS officer, is due for promotion to the rank of additional director general of police (ADGP). He is scheduled to retire next year.