Nearly 80,000 Delhi cops await promotion for last 10 years

India Today: New Delhi: Friday, 19 December 2014.

It's an endless wait to get promoted for 21,000 Delhi Police personnel. About one-fourth of Delhi Police personnel, in the nearly 80,000-strong force, are waiting for their promotion for the last 10 years, but that remains elusive.

Promotions are due for the assistant commissioners, inspectors, sub-inspectors and constables. But it seems the top cops of the force are not bothered about the issue. Despite vacancies at various levels in the force, the personnel are not promoted which could have filled these vacancies.

Interestingly, some of these personnel are drawing salaries meant for the higher ranks even though they have not been promoted.

In a reply to an RTI query Delhi Police has admitted that there are about 6,000 vacancies in the force. There are 162 vacancies in the rank of assistant commissioner.

According to the RTI reply, there are vacancies for 3,657 constables and 1,347 head constables. At the same time, about 7,282 constables and 8,896 head constables are waiting for their promotions for several years.

According to the reply, even though there are 1,508 vacancies for the post of sub-inspectors, 3,382 assistant sub inspectors are waiting for their promotions. Interestingly, they are drawing the salary of a sub inspector though they have not been promoted till date.

According to a senior Delhi Police official, there are many instances where police personnel got four promotions in just a few years but many cops are still waiting for their second promotion. "A sub-inspector got four promotions and became a deputy commissioner of police as he had good relations with various top police officials, including various commissioners. There's biasness within Delhi Police. Even though there are about 6,000 vacancies, several policemen are waiting for their promotion, and senior officials are not saying anything about it," an inspector of the force told MAIL TODAY.

"There are various inspectors and assistant commissioners of police who will retire soon. But so far, they have got just one or two promotions. We have informed and requested the top brass to fill in the vacancies but nothing has happened," another top police official told MAIL TODAY. "Recently, when few officials went to meet a special commissioner to talk about this issue, he strangely replied that we have to wait for some time as there are few vacancies," he added.

"Delhi Police can easily promote at least 35 per cent of its personnel. But senior officials are not bothered. Every year several police personnel retire. That creates vacancies, but hardly 10 per cent of the vacancies are being filled through promotions," the official said.

Curiously, the number of sub-inspectors waiting for promotion is almost 30 times more than the current vacancies in the rank of inspector. According to the RTI data, about 660 sub-inspectors are waiting for their promotions but there are only 23 vacancies in the rank of inspector.