A group of officers of SRP Camp at Hingna are said to have met district Shiv Sena chief Subodh Mohite with a request to take up their grievances with Chief Minister Manohar Joshi as the senior officials of their set up had failed to redress them. The delegation of SRP officers particularly highlighted a case of harassment of a women employee of Group IV.

The move is likely to stir up the State police set up since the force has been known for its discipline-unionism and political intervention being taboo.

Mohite is said to have assured the officers that their case will be taken up with the chief minister and asked them to provide documents related to the case. ``I asked theSRP men to come along with the documents. But they did not return after Joshi was put under suspension by the State Government,'' Mohite said when contacted by The Indian Express.

Though Commandant Joshi has now been placed under suspension on charges of indiscipline and insubordination, an uneasy calm still prevails in the SRP camp. Several SRP employees and officers narrated their sufferings faced during Joshi's tenure to this paper.

In a particular case, Joshi is said to have disconnected water and power supply to the residence of a woman employee, absorbed in the force following death of her husband, a SRP jawan. Though the woman made several representations to the Commandant, her pleas went unheard, it is learnt.

Later, the aggrieved woman employee lodged a complaint against Joshi at the MIDC police station with a hope of getting justice.

But the situation worsened when Joshi refused to allow the MIDC police to record his statement on the grounds that the SRP camp did not fall under thejurisdiction of MIDC police.

Notwithstanding the intervention of the MIDC police, the water and power connection to the woman's residence remained disrupted till the DIG personally intervened.

Joshi remained in limelight throughout his short stint as Commandant, mainly because he challenged the existence of posts of several of his seniors on the grounds of constitutional validity. Joshi, from time to time informed his seniors that he would not follow their orders since the posts they were occupying were not ratified by the Union Government. As a result of his conviction, he disobeyed every senior of the rank and file of the SRP, sources said.

During his early days at the SRP, he would convey this view while returning the orders of his seniors. But later on, he virtually took them head on. Once again the sufferers were not the senior officers but the lower staff. At a juncture, Joshi even issued orders asking his office staff not to allow any other SRP personnel to enter his office particularly those whocame to deliver official communication.

A SRP official told that one of Joshi's order specifically asked his staff to use force if any SRP man attempted to barge into his office. The Government Employees Sanghatana has also lodged a complaint to the State Government in this connection.

Officers and men of the Unconventional Operations Training Centre (UOTC) and the Group XIII SRP also faced the wrath of Joshi. Both the units are stationed in Group IV and were asked to vacate the premises by Joshi. The two units were on the verge of collapse when the Group IV disconnected water supply to the units this summer.

Lack of immediate attention from seniors worsened the situation to the extent that the UOTC and Group XIII officers sought help of other police units to provide water tankers for supply of drinking water to hundreds of families residing in the camp.

Incidentally, the present DIG (SRP), Pankaj Gupta and Commandant Joshi belong to the same batch of the Indian Police Service. When contacted byThe Indian Express, Gupta refused to comment on the issue, but added that the SRP being a disciplined force, no indiscipline would be tolerated.Commandant Joshi could not be contacted as he was out of station.