Police officer who had sought VRS after humiliation by Karnataka CM, attends duty

Dharwad: A police officer who had sought voluntary retirement from service (VRS), after facing the Karnataka Chief Minister’s anger during a Congress rally in April, on Thursday said he was attending to his duty.

Dharwad additional Superintendent of Police (ASP) Narayan Baramani said that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, home minister G Parameshwara, and higher officials spoke to him.

He did not comment on the episode and the status of his VRS, citing that he is in a disciplined department.

“As I’m in a disciplined department, I have shared my feelings with my higher officials. The Chief Minister, Home Minister, and higher officials have spoken to me in this regard. I’m attending duty,” Baramani told reporters.

Siddaramaiah, on April 28, had lost his cool and made a gesture by raising his hand at a police officer on the stage, as a group of women, allegedly BJP workers, tried to disrupt his speech during a rally in Belagavi.

As a group of women who were amidst the large crowd showed a black flag and shouted slogans during his speech, visibly upset Siddaramaiah summoned the Additional SP rank officer onto the stage. He addressed him in singular and said, “Come here, who is the SP? What are you doing?”.

The CM was then seen making a gesture by raising his hand at the officer out of frustration, but withdrew it immediately, and subsequently instructed him to remove the people who were creating a disturbance.

“Having been publicly insulted and humiliated by the behavior of the Chief Minister on a public platform for a mistake I did not commit, I have no other option but to seek voluntary retirement,” Baramani’s purported letter to the Home Department said.

Sharing the contents of the letter, Leader of Opposition in the Karnataka Assembly R Ashoka, in a post on ‘X’, on Thursday, alleged that the morale of the police department has been damaged by the Congress government.

“Whether the incident in which you raised your hand at Additional SP Narayan Baramani on a public platform was due to your arrogance of power or frustration at leading a failed government, or with a feeling that you will have to relinquish power soon, I will leave that to your introspection,” he told Siddaramaiah.

“But your action has damaged the self-respect of a dutiful officer. It has brought down the morale of the entire police department. It has hurt the morality of the bureaucracy, and the self-confidence of the workforce has collapsed,” he added.