THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: With just months to go before state police chief Loknath Behra retires, various groups have come up staking a claim for the post of the state police chief. While one group claims that Tomin J Thachankary should be the next police chief, another group favouring Sudesh Kumar has strongly opposed this. Both sides have started to dig up and terminate the cases in the name of both officers.

Loknath Behera will step down from the post of DGP on June 30. There are rumors that the state government may appoint him to other posts. Meanwhile, reports claimed that Behera might leave Kerala in May itself if he gets named as the director of CBI.

The Centre will nominate a new police chief from the list of senior officials handed over by the state. As part of this, stated has prepared and handed over a list of IPS officers up to 1989 batch to the Centre. This list contains the names of both Tomin J Thachankary and Sudesh Kumar.

Sudesh Kumar is an officer who was involved in the police slavery controversy. A move is currently made at the police headquarters to settle a crime branch case against Sudesh Kumar's daughter for assaulting a police driver. Meanwhile, Vigilance is conducting a re-investigation against Thachankary in a case of illegal acquisition of property. Following this, both sides are making moves to prevent the other from being named as the police chief.