Lucknow: Months after he reminded the Uttar Pradesh Police about the usage of the Panchang (Hindu calendar) to tackle unwanted crime in ‘amavasya’ (dark period), stars have aligned favourably for Vijaya Kumar to present him a new innings in khadi after years in khaki.
Kumar, a former Uttar Pradesh DGP, and his wife Anupama joined the BJP on Monday in the presence of Deputy Chief Minister Brajesh Pathak, barely two months after he retired from police service.
Last year, the 1988-batch IPS officer had issued an order to police officers in districts to study crime records of UP 112 ( police emergency helpline) and criminal tracking network and systems (CCTNS) during the ‘amavasya’ period and to prepare a plan to tackle illegal activities. Back then, Kumar also gave a presentation on how to use ‘Panchang’ for policing.
Those in the Uttar Pradesh police set-up say Kumar is the second retired UP DGP to take plunge in politics after Brij Lal, who currently is a BJP Rajya Sabha MP.
Hailing from the Dalit community, Kumar served as the fourth acting UP DGP from June 2023 to January 2024. While Kumar succeeded R.K. Vishwakarma as acting DGP, Prashant Kumar took over from him this year.
“There’s a lot of scope to work for the people here. In politics, we need to be open to people whereas there’s a distance in policing. I don’t think I’ll have any problem because I am used to working amidst the people. I am impressed by the policies of PM Modi and have worked with CM Yogi under whom the law and order situation has improved,” Kumar told the media after he joined the BJP on Monday.
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Served in Yogi’s constituency
Born in Prayagraj, Kumar comes from a humble family. His father Ram Prasad Ahirwar was a sub-inspector himself. He went on to do B.Tech in civil engineering at IIT-Kanpur and cracked the UPSC exam in second attempt to become an IPS officer.
Kumar had served in UP CM Yogi Adityanath’s constituency Gorakhpur along with Nainital and Rudrapur as assistant Superintendent of Police, and later served as Superintendent of Police/Senior Superintendent of Police of Bareilly, Maharajganj, Banda, Muzaffarnagar, Pilibhit, Gorakhpur and Lucknow districts.
He also served as the Inspector General of Police of Prayagraj and Additional Director General of Agra and Kanpur zones.
“Kumar is a scholarly person known for his pursuits in archaeology, but as a police officer, he had a casual approach. He is not someone who can be described as a go-getter or initiative oriented. However, he was never seen as having any links with a political party,” a senior police officer, who has worked with Kumar, told ThePrint.
The officer recounted that while ex-DGP Brij Lal was accused of bias and siding with the Bahujan Samaj Party while in service, Vijay Kumar had no such baggage.
Lal was removed as the UP DGP in 2012 by the Election Commission when the opposition parties demanded that the police chief and the principal secretary (home) be removed for a free and fair election.
Another UP police officer, who has worked with Kumar, said that the retired officer’s tenure in Gorakhpur helped him develop a rapport with Yogi Adityanath.
“Soon after Yogi Adityanath took over as the CM, Kumar was removed from the post of ADG (police training school) Sitapur and appointed as the ADG (security) even before the new DGP was appointed,” the officer recalled.
Given that he studied the archaeological remnants in Bundelkhand, Maharajganj, Chitrakoot, Banda and Lalitpur during and after his postings, it comes as no surprise that Kumar is the founder and chief editor of the Indian Journal of Archaeology.
The journal publishes articles from archaeology enthusiasts from across different states. Kumar has himself written several such papers including about the terracotta artefacts kept at Kailash Deep Research Institute, Meerut; antiquities found around Ram Janki Temple Kalinjar Fort, Banda and sealings kept at Bihar’s Nalanda Archaeological Museum and many more.
He has penned a book on archaeological findings in Aligarh and Hathras, ‘Archaeology of Indo-Gangetic Plains’, and another one on the archaeological findings in Chitrakoot, Banda and Lalitpur.
Kumar also has a private museum of sorts in the basement of his Lucknow house where stones and archaeological antiquities from Bundelkhand are kept on display.
‘Panchang policing’
In August last year, Kumar had issued an order to police officers asking them to study UP 112 ad crime and criminal tracking network and systems (CCTNS) and prepare a mapping scheme to deal with illegal activities within a day and a week respectively to deal with criminal activities.
Ex-DGP Sulkhan Singh confirmed that this is a traditional method of policing and dealing with crime. “Traditionally, police used the lunar month to decide on patrolling and surveillance in urban and rural areas, especially in the yore when dacoities and burglaries were rampant in the dark. The 15-day period at the junction of the dark and bright fortnight is considered crucial from the point of policing,” he said.
Explaining why this period is important, he said that the dark fortnight starts from after the first seven days from the full moon (purnima) have passed till seven days have passed from the new moon night (amavasya).
“The dark fortnight falls at the junction of two fortnights when it gets really dark and police need to take special precautions between 10 pm and 4 am. Dacoities and burglaries would happen in this period. The police would resort to patrolling especially after 9 pm in rural areas and after 10 pm in urban areas. On ‘amavasya’, precaution is exercised throughout the night because there is no moonlight. The seven days before and after ‘amavasya’ are crucial,” he said.
The method finds mention in a book by a former Hyderabad IG in the pre-Independence era highlighting how to prevent burglaries, Singh said.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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