Khwaja Hassan Gafoor had a tenure of less than 16 months as Mumbai Police Commissioner but his term was anything but short of action. The soft-spoken and low-profile Gafoor was thought to be the ideal choice as his predecessor D N Jadhav had come in for severe criticism for being dismissive about certain shocking crimes in the financial capital.

Gafoor had his hands full from the word go. He took over at the peak of the anti-migrant campaign launched by Raj Thackeray and his Maharashtra Navnirman Sena and the 44,000-strong force he headed had came under national focus for its inability to swiftly deal with Thackeray and his goons, apparently because of a lack of political backing. But that crisis was nothing compared to the carnage of 26/11 when 10 Lashkar-e-Toiba men raided the city and virtually held it to ransom for three days.

With the response of the Mumbai Police in the first hours of the siege coming under attack and the state Government appointing a two-member panel to probe the issues raised by the response, the writing was on the wall for Gafoor and it seemed more like a matter of time before he would be replaced.

In fact, when the likes of Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, Deputy CM R R Patil and Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil lost their post-attacks, political circles were abuzz about how politicians had been scapegoats while bureaucrats and police officers were not held accountable.

With the Pradhan panel report due to be submitted in the Assembly this week, and the inquiry apparently laying much of the blame at Gafoor’s door, the 1974-batch IPS officer was on Saturday shifted out and appointed Director-General of Maharashtra Police Housing and Welfare Corporation — “a promotion and not a transfer”, as he was quick to point out.

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