Garg pays price for acting tough against land grabbing

Transfer of Police Commissioner raises many eyebrows KMP Patnaik

Visakhapatnam: Transfer of Amit Garg did not come as a surprise to the local people. Garg joined as a Commissioner here in January last year and served for 15 months and became the shortest serving officer ever to work in Visakhapatnam.

Though the senior police officers call it as a routine transfer, which was done, along with many officers in the State, including two IPS officers in the district, many attribute various reasons for his shifting. Some say he did not see eye- to- eye with the powerful Minister for HRD Ganta Srinivasa Rao and other ruling party members while others say the main reason was his commitment to prevent land grabbing that had earned him rivalry with the ruling party bosses.

It may be recalled that a month after he took over as the Commissioner, Garg had told the reporters in an informal meeting that he would invoke Preventive Detention Act against land grabbers to prevent law and order problems that were being reported in most of the police stations.

“It is a routine transfer. I am going out happily,” Garg told this correspondent on Wednesday denying that he was victimised for going hard on the land grabbers.