Karnataka DGP to be the next CBI Director

Guwahati: Karnataka Director General of Police Praveen Sood will take over as director of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

A three-person committee consisting of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud, and Leader of the Opposition (Congress) in the Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury decided on Praveen Sood’s name on Saturday.

On the basis of the panel’s recommendation, the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) allegedly approved Sood’s appointment.

The committee selected three top IPS officers from the Madhya Pradesh, Delhi, and Karnataka cadres during a meeting for the position of CBI Director.

Since Mr. Sood was not selected from the initial panel of officers who were shortlisted for the top CBI position, Mr. Chowdhury wrote a dissenting note in opposition to Mr. Sood’s name.

Notably, Mr. Sood is an IPS officer from the Karnataka cadre’s 1986 batch. Three years ago, he was chosen to be the state’s DGP. He attended IIT-Delhi and is a native of Himachal Pradesh. He was scheduled to retire in May 2024, but he will now have a fixed tenure of two years, keeping him in office at least until May 2025.

The CBI was searching for a new director as Subodh Kumar Jaiswal’s term as director draws to a close. On May 26, 2021, Jaiswal, a member of the IPS’s 1985 batch from the Maharashtra cadre and a former commissioner of the Mumbai Police, succeeded R.K. Shukla as director of the CBI.