Alok Kumar withdraws transfer case from CAT

In an unprecedented move, senior IPS officer Alok Kumar, who had approached the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) after he was shunted out from the police commissioner's post by the Yediyurappa government, withdrew his application on Friday.

Kumar had served as police commissioner for 47 days when his stint came to an abrupt end following the change in government. He was replaced with Bhaskar Rao.

Taking strong objection to the transfer order, Kumar had approached CAT citing provisions of the Karnataka Police Act, 1963, which guaranteed a minimum tenure of one-year for such postings.

Admitting the case, the CAT had issued notices to the state government and police commissioner Bhaskar Rao seeking their responses.

However, as the case came up for hearing before the CAT, Kumar submitted a plea on Friday seeking permission to withdraw his application and was granted the same.

Earlier, the issue of transfer had taken a twist with the leak of audio tapes, which purportedly contained conversations of Rao and a man identified as Faraz over lobbying for the city police commissioner post.

Soon, the phone tapping controversy snowballed into a major controversy, as allegations of politicians' and senior police officers' phones being tapped surfaced.

Accusations were also made against the H D Kumaraswamy government for eavesdropping.