Reporter's Diary: When transfer orders are occupational hazards

More often than not, the latter demand for transfers to save their marriage. Recently, a woman SP and an IG was transferred out to different departments after the IG’s wife went and complained about the woman SP to the DGP accusing her of having an affair with her husband. 

The DGP, who already had enough department woes on his plate, solved the problem by shunting both officers out to stations far away, that it was impossible for them to meet on a day to day basis. This is not a stray case as, if sources in DGP’s office are to be believed, several such complaints go to the DGP on a regular basis and the complainant is usually the wife of an officer who would plead to the top cop to save their marriage. 

Though such complaints from spouses of senior officials are taken seriously, a female inspector said that many times the ‘affairs’ are one-sided  where senior officers take advantage of their rank and exploit junior woman cops. “Instead of waiting for the wives to complain about so-called affairs, if officials took notice of sexual harassment complaints from woman cops, this problem would not even arise,” the lady inspector said. — K Praveen Kumar, Chennai