IPS Officer Hemanth Nimbalkar, who has been embroiled in a series of controversies, has once again been transferred. He will take charge as the Inspector General of Police, Directorate of Civil Rights Enforcement, with immediate effect, on January 11, until further notice. It was only on December 31, 2020, that Nimbalkar was transferred to the post of Inspector General of Police, Internal Security Division in Bengaluru.
In the wake of a raging controversy surrounding the Safe City Project for Bengaluru and the open rift between senior IPS officers D Roopa and Hemant Nimbalkar, the two were allocated new postings by the Karnataka Government. Roopa, the first woman Home Secretary in the state, was posted as the Managing Director of Karnataka State Handicrafts Development Corporation Ltd, Bengaluru. According to the earlier transfer order, Nimbalkar, who was the Additional Commissioner (Administration), Bengaluru, was shifted to the Internal Security Department, Bengaluru.
The tendering process of the multi-crore Bengaluru Safe City Project had exposed rifts in the top IAS/IPS circle in Karnataka over alleged double standards in dealing with corruption charges. Roopa and Nimbalkar publicly exchanged allegations of misconduct regarding the project.
Roopa suspected that Nimbalkar, being the chief of the tendering committee, was favouring a particular committee, thus violating norms. Nimbalkar, on the other hand, had alleged that Roopa, as the Home Secretary, was interfering with the process without any authority. However, Roopa maintained the stance that she was made part of the decision-making process by the Chief Secretary himself.
In a letter she wrote to Chief Secretary Vijaya Bhaskar, Roopa also alleged that while the Home Department had started a prompt inquiry against a “false and motivated” complaint against her, it hesitated to do the same against Nimbalkar in spite of CBI's sanction of the prosecution that they sought months ago. The letter mentions that the CBI sought sanction to prosecute five police officers, including Nimbalkar, in September 2020.
In 2009, IPS officer Hemanth Nimbalkar was also alleged to be a part of a small club of four IPS officers that was raided by the Lok Ayukta for possessing assets disproportionate to their known sources of income. P Kempiah, Srikantappa and MC Narayana Gowda were the other three officers who were investigated.