The Narendra Modi government on Wednesday appointed a Gujarat-cadre IPS officer, Rakesh Asthana, Additional Director of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for a four-year tern. A 1984-batch IPS officer, Mr. Asthana is considered close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah.
Mr. Asthana is the second IPS officer from Gujarat to be appointed in the premier investigative agency on a senior position. Earlier, Arun Kumar Sharma was appointed joint director. Mr. Sharma too is known to be close to both Mr. Modi and BJP president Amit Shah. Before his deputation, Mr. Sharma was the Joint Commissioner of Police, Ahmedabad Crime Branch.
Key assignmentsAmong the important assignments Mr. Asthana had handled in Gujarat include being the head of a special investigation team (SIT) that probed the Godhra train burning in which 59 Hindu activists were charred to death near the Godhra railway station in February 2002.
The incident triggered State-wide riots in which more than 1,000 people, mostly from the minority community, were massacred on the streets.
Mr. Asthana has been the Commissioner of Police in Vadodara and Surat. This will be his second stint in the CBI, where earlier he was on deputation as a Superintendent of Police (SP) in Patna and had arrested RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav in the fodder scam.
