State reinstates IPS officer Saurabh Tripathi

The Maharashtra government has reinstated IPS officer Saurabh Tripathi, who was suspended in connection with an extortion case 15 months ago.

The Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis government has reinstated IPS officer Saurabh Tripathi, more than 15 months after he was suspended in connection with an extortion case, home department officials said. Tripathi was the deputy commissioner of police (DCP), zone 2, when his name was added to an FIR registered at LT Marg police station last year.

Mumbai, India - March 22, 2022: Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Saurabh Tripathi suspended by Maharashtra home department after being booked in the Angadia extortion case, in Mumbai, India, on Tuesday, March 22, 2022. (HT Photo) (Hindustan Times)

The state’s Suspension Review Committee, headed by chief secretary Manoj Saunik, met last week and decided to revoke Tripathi’s suspension, officials said and added that the decision was conveyed to the home department on Wednesday. Now, the Police Establishment Board will decide his new posting. Sources, however, said he is likely to get a non-executive posting.

Earlier this year, Tripathi’s request for reinstatement was rejected twice by the committee, headed by the then chief secretary Manukumar Srivastava. Recently, he again approached the panel, citing a Supreme Court judgement that said an officer can’t be kept under suspension for more than three months.

Based on a complaint by Bhuleshwar Angadia Association (traditional couriers who deliver cash or jewellery from one trader to another), a case against inspector Om Wangate, inspector Nitin Kadam, and assistant inspector Samadhan Jamdade was registered at LT Marg police station on February 18, 2022. The trio were charged with sections dealing with extortion, robbery and wrongful restraint of the Indian Penal Code.

A preliminary enquiry by the then additional commissioner of police (south), Dilip Sawant, found that the three had in the first week of December 2021 extorted ₹19 lakh from angadias in south Mumbai after threatening to report them to the income tax department, the FIR said.

Tripathi, who was then DCP of zone 2, went incommunicado the very next day. His name was added to the FIR on March 9 last year after Wangate allegedly revealed on being interrogated that they were acting on Tripathi’s instructions. The three officers were arrested on March 16.

Meanwhile, the crime branch issued a lookout circular against Tripathi and sent teams to his hometown in UP. On March 22, 2022, the state home department suspended Tripathi, pending a departmental enquiry.

On April 8, the police named Tripathi’s father Neel Kanth Tiwari, a retired government official, as an accused in the case. The Police Establishment Board in October last year reinstated Wangate, Kadam and Jamdade.

The sessions court on October 19 denied Tripathi anticipatory bail, after which he approached the Bombay high court. He even moved a plea in the Supreme Court seeking to transfer the case from the Mumbai police to the Central Bureau of Investigation, but later withdrew the petition.

On November 15, the HC granted anticipatory bail to Tripathi on grounds that he had cooperated with the investigators and his custodial investigation was not required.