Bengal to appoint 23 special law officers to strengthen cases in different courts

Kolkata, Nov 14 (IANS) In the backdrop of a series of setbacks in different courts in a number of cases, the West Bengal government has decided to appoint 23 special law officers for different state government departments.

The decision follows the two recent developments where first the state government replaced its erstwhile public prosecutors for Calcutta High Court Sashwatagopal Mukhopadhyay, and the erstwhile state Advocate General S.N. Mukhopadhyay resigned from his post.

These law officers will be appointed for different state government departments, directorates, police commiserates and different district magistrate offices. Sources from the state secretariat said that experts in criminal cases will be mainly appointed as special law officers, since this is the area where the state government received maximum setbacks at different courts in the recent past.

State secretariat insiders said that recently there were rounds of evaluations on the reasons for the setbacks. “It was revealed in the course of evaluations that lack of coordination had been the main reasons behind these setbacks and hence the decision to appoint such special law officers was taken,” he said.

While Debasish Roy has been announced as the public prosecutor, the state government is yet to announce the name of the new state advocate general.

Speculation was also there over the name for the new advocate general. Rumours are there that Kishor Dutta, who was the advocate general before Mukhopadhyay and was replaced after the 2021 state Assembly polls, might be reinstated.