R. K. Singh

Raj Kumar Singh is an Indian politician who formerly served as a 1975 batch Bihar cadre Indian Administrative Service officer.^[1] On 30 October 1990, when district magistrate of Samastipur, he arrested L. K. Advani, a senior figure in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), while Advani's rath yatra was en route to Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh from Somnath in Gujarat. The arrest was made by order of the Lalu Prasad Yadav government.^[2]

There was speculation that Singh would contest from the Bihar constituencies of either Arrah or Supaul in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, though Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh objected to him contesting from Supaul.^{[3][4][5][6][7]} On 13 December 2013, Singh joined the BJP.^[8][9] He contested the election as a BJP candidate in Arrah, beating his nearest rival by a margin of over 135000 votes.^[10][11][12]

Early life and career

R. K. Singh is a native of Supaul district in Bihar.^[13] He was the district magistrate in East Champaran and Patna in the 1980s before joining the state home department in 1997. During the Nitish Kumar government's first term (2004–2009), Singh, as principal secretary in the road construction department, played an important role in improving the condition of roads in Bihar.^[14][15] In the National Democratic Alliance-led government, the then Home Minister, Advani, selected Singh to work as joint secretary in the Home Ministry for five years from 1999 to 2004.^[16] R.K.Singh was Union Home Secretary of India from 30 June 2011 to 30 June 2013,after that he retired from service.^{[17][18][19][20][21]} In 2013, Singh was tipped to be adviser (infrastructure) in the Nitish Kumar-led Bihar government,a post created through cabinet approval. However,he did not accepted the assignment.^[22] Before his appointment as Union home Secretary, Union Defence Minister A. K. Antony had picked Singh to head the department of defence production in 2009 in view of his clean reputation.^[23][24]

Disagreement on views in UPA-II Government

Since Singh's retirement from the Home Ministry in June 2013, he made his sympathies for the BJP clear, publicly expressing views against the United Progressive Alliance's policy on internal security and also its stance regarding Pakistan.^[25] Singh was chosenby the then Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram for his efficiency and no-nonsense attitude. Known to be a tough taskmaster, Chidambaram got along well with Singh at a professional level. However, Singh had several run-ins with Chidambaram's successor, Sushilkumar Shinde, who was not happy with the home secretary's handling of the situation following the 16 December 2012 Delhi gang rape.^[26]

There were other instances where Singh is said to have been in disagreement with the minister. One such was the Sayed Liyaqat Shah case. Liyaqat, a surrendered militant who was to be rehabilitated, was arrested by Delhi Police on 20 March on the Nepal border. Shinde had handed over the case to the National Investigation Agency against Singh's advice.

See also

• Syed Shahnawaz Hussain

References

Members of the 16th Lok Sabha from Bihar State 15th LS Members 17th LS Members GE 2014 Tasleem Uddin Raj Kumar Singh Sushil Kumar Singh Jay Prakash Narayan Yadav Bhola Singh Shailesh Kumar Mandal Ashwini Kumar Choubey Kirti Azad Hari Manjhi Janak Ram Ram Vilas Paswan Dr Arun Kumar Chirag Paswan Virendra Kumar Choudhary Upendra Kushwaha Tariq Anwar Mehboob Ali Kaiser Moh Asrarul Huq Pappu Yadav Hukmdev Narayan Yadav Janardan Singh Sigriwal Veena Devi Ajay Nishad Kaushlendra Kumar Giriraj Singh Dr Sanjay Jaiswal Ram Kripal Yadav Shatrughan Sinha Santosh Kumar Radha Mohan Singh Ram Chandra Paswan Rajiv Pratap Rudy Chhedi Paswan Rama Devi Ram Kumar Sharma Om Prakash Yadav Ranjeet Ranjan Nityanand Rai Rama Kishor Singh Satish Chandra Dubey Members of the 16th Lok Sabha from States: AP BH CT GA GJ HR HP JK JH KL KA MP MH OR PB RJ TN TG UP UT WB Northeast: AR AS MN ML MZ NL SK TR Union Territories: AN CH DN DD LD DL PY