The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) on Monday cleared the names of IPS officers Samant Kumar Goel, Mohd Mustafa, and Dinkar Gupta, for the post of Punjab DGP. The UPSC meeting was also attended by DGP Suresh Arora and Punjab chief secretary Karan Avtar Singh.

 

Mustafa, DGP (anti-drugs special task Force) and husband of Punjab higher education minister Razia Sultana, is seen as the strongest contender for the post. He is due to retire in February 2021.

A 1985-batch officer, Mustafa is second in seniority to Samant Kumar Goel but is believed to enjoy the support of the ruling party where many leaders perceive him as “anti-Akali”, mostly because his wife is a minister in Amarinder Singh’s Cabinet.

 

Arora, the incumbent DGP, was often accused of being “soft” on Akalis — he was elevated to the top post on October 25, 2015, by the then SAD-BJP government — by the Congress leadership. However, Amarinder Singh, who took charge in 2017, had retained him as under his tenure, Punjab Police busted a number of terror modules and cracked a spate of cases of targeted killings carried out in 2016 and 2017.

 

Goel, the senior-most IPS officer among three, is on a central deputation to R&AW. He is due to retire in May 2020. He had met Amarinder Singh in Delhi recently, fueling speculation that he too was in the race for the top post.

 

The youngest among the three is 1987-batch officer Dinkar Gupta, the DGP (Intelligence), who is due to retire in March 2024. He faces opposition from members of the ruling party as he is considered close to DGP Arora.