Chief Secretary K.S. Jawahar Reddy and Director-General of Police (DGP) Harish Kumar Gupta appeared before Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar and Election Commissioners Gyanesh Kumar and Sukhbir Singh Sandhu in New Delhi on Thursday and explained the circumstances that led to violence during the elections conducted on May 13 and its immediate aftermath in Palnadu, Annamaya, Chittoor, Guntur, Anantapur and Nandyal districts.
They were accompanied by Additional DGP (Intelligence) Kumar Vishwajeet.
An official release said the Election Commission approved the State government’s proposals to transfer Palnadu District Collector, suspend the Superintendents of Police (SP) of Palnadu and Anantapur districts, transfer Tirupati SP, suspend 12 subordinate police officials in the three districts and to set up a Special Investigation Team to probe the matter and submit an action taken report to the Election Commission in two days in each of those cases.
The poll panel expressed displeasure over the post-poll violence and directed the Chief Secretary and DGP to make sure that such violence was not repeated and to task all SPs with pre-emptive measures to avoid such a situation in future.
Besides, the Commission directed that the Chief Secretary and DGP should ensure timely filing of chargesheets against the culprits preferably within the Model Code of Conduct period.
It may be noted that the Election Commission summoned the Chief Secretary and DGP to personally explain reasons for the failure to contain the violence and steps being taken to avoid any such incidents in the run-up to the all-important counting of votes on June 4.
