The commissioner system in New Delhi, the capital of India was started in 1978, with J.N.Chaturvedi being appointed as the first Police Commissioner. It replaced the earlier Inspector General of Police system, where the Inspector General of police would report to the Chief Secretary, thus having a dual authority in effect. The Commissioner system brought an end to this dual authority as since then the appointed Commissioner of Director General of Police (DGP) rank being equivalent to its counterpart Chief Secretary reports directly to the Lieutenant-Governor of National Capital Territory of Delhi.
The issue of appointment of police commissioners of New Delhi, has not been without controversies. The most recent controversy was when a senior police officer Kiran Bedi was superseded to appoint her junior Dadwal as the Police Commissioner in July 2007. Bedi went on record saying that at a time, when the President of India as well as the chairperson of the ruling alliance UPA were women (Pratibha Patil and Sonia Gandhi respectively), it would have done a lot of good for country's image as well as for the upliftment of women if she had been appointed. She resigned soon after in protest, although her official line was that she wanted to devote more time to social work.