Chennai  :

Archana Ramasundaram, a 1980-batch IPS officer of Tamil Nadu cadre, has been appointed director general of Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB), a paramilitary organisation guarding the country’s eastern frontiers with Nepal and Bhutan. She is the first woman IPS officer to head SSB since its inception in 1963 and will continue in that post till her retirement on September 30, happy to head next year. “I am happy to head SSB and want to use my years of experience to improve the force,”Ramasundaram told TOI over phone.

In 2014, she was caught in a tug-of-war between the Centre and Tamil Nadu government when the UPA government was in power. She was selected as additional director of CBI in Delhi after clearance from the state government. But the state did not relieve her from TN police after she was selected for the CBI post. Ramasundaram, who has replaced B D Sharma, another official from her batch, who retired from service on January 31, was director of National Crime Records Bureau in New Delhi since June last year. The Union government had upgraded the post of director NCRB to that of director general of police to accommodate her in that post.

In 2014, based on instruction from Centre to join duty at CBI headquarters, she sent a letter to the chief secretary of Tamil Nadu and shifted to Delhi in 2014. This resulted in her suspension by the state government on charges that she deserted office. The Centre, last year, quashed her suspension. Though the state moved the Delhi high court on appeal, the petition was dismissed.

Ramasundaram, known among her colleagues as an upright official, is the senior most IPS officer in Tamil Nadu cadre at present. The pre sent DGP of Tamil Nadu Ashok Kumar, is two years junior to her. She hails from Ballia in Uttar Pradesh and is married to S Ramasunda ram, a 1979 batch IAS officer from Tamil Nadu, who took voluntary retirement from service in 2011.

There are five paramilitary forces SSB, Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) Border Security Force (BSF) Central Industrial Security Force and Indo Tibetan Border Police and none has ever had a woman chief.

Besides Ramasundaram, IPS officers, K Durga Prasad and K K Sharma, have been appointed directors general of CRPF and BSF, respectively.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Chennai / TNN / February 02nd, 2016