Avinash Mohanty breaks mould and lets actions speak louder

At a time when publicity-hungry cops never miss an opportunity to pose with recoveries of booties after busting gangs of property offenders or bull-dozing modified bike silencers as if they went beyond their call of duty;  Avinash Mohanty, the youngest Police Commissioner, is rewriting the rulebook, and it is not going unnoticed. Steering clear of the spotlight, Mohanty gets his team’s Deputy Commissioners to hold press conferences – in stark contrast to the ways of his predecessors who basked in media glare. “At the Commissioner level, my job is to empower my team,” Mohanty told this correspondent, after the Annual Press Meet. “It has been nearly two years, but how many press meetings have you actually seen me in?” While deigning to attend the annual pressers, Mohanty has extended his minimalist style to the annual reports. Last year, he ditched the hefty booklets for a single sheet encapsulating vital statistics. This year, he pared it down further: pure data, no frills. What if other Commissionerates proudly display officer headshots? “Why waste space with photos when journalists need the facts?” a senior officer under his command quipped. Clearly, Mohanty is on a mission to let the numbers do the talking. His quiet revolution has started making waves.