Mumbai: The Maharashtra government has appointed senior Indian Police Service (IPS) officer Rashmi Shukla as the new Director General of Police (DGP) of the state on Thursday. Shukla, a 1988 batch IPS officer, was previously serving as the Director General of Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB), a paramilitary force under the Ministry of Home Affairs, on deputation. She will take over the charge of DGP Maharashtra from Mumbai Police Commissioner Vivek Phansalkar, who has held the additional charge since the retirement of former DGP Rajneesh Seth on December 31, 2023.
Shukla’s appointment comes after a meeting of the Central Public Service Commission (CPSC) last Friday (29 December), which shortlisted three names for the post of DGP Maharashtra. The CPSC had sent the list of names to the Maharashtra government, which had the final authority to select the DGP. The state government chose Shukla as the new DGP.
Shukla will have a tenure of six months as the DGP, which can be extended by the state government. She is the second woman to become the DGP of Maharashtra, after Meeran Borwankar, who held the post in 2016. Shukla has a distinguished career in the police service, having worked as the Pune Police Commissioner, the State Intelligence Commissioner, and the SSB chief. She is known for her expertise in cybercrime, intelligence, and security.
However, Shukla’s appointment also comes amid a controversy over her alleged involvement in illegal phone tapping of politicians during the previous BJP-led government in the state. Shukla was accused of tapping the phones of NCP leader Eknath Khadse, Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut, and Congress state president Nana Patole, and sharing the information with then Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. She was also booked for tapping the phone of Patole while she was the Pune Police Commissioner. She had denied the allegations and claimed that she had followed the due process of law. She had also approached the Bombay High Court to quash the FIR against her. The court had granted her interim relief and stayed the proceedings in the cyber police station. The case is still pending in the court.
