From St Stephen’s College to Capital’s top cop — SBK Singh takes charge of Delhi Police

Singh arrived at the Delhi Police Headquarters a little after 4 pm, received the guard of honour and went to his office on the 17th floor, where Arora handed over the reins. He was greeted by Special Commissioners of Police, Joint Commissioners, as well as some Deputy Commissioners.

Singh is Arora’s batchmate and the youngest officer in his batch. He is set to retire on January 31, 2026.

The previous two police chiefs were from outside the AGMUT cadre — Arora is from the Tamil Nadu cadre, while his predecessor, Rakesh Asthana, belonged to the Gujarat cadre.

Stephen’s alumnus, held key roles in force

With an illustrious career spanning over 36 years, Singh has held several pivotal positions in the Delhi Police and also served as the head of police forces in two northeastern states — Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh.

An alumnus of Delhi University’s St Stephen’s College, where he studied Physics (Honours), Singh joined the Indian Police Service after graduation in 1986. He also pursued an MBA degree with a specialisation in Human Resource Management from IGNOU.

He started his career as an Assistant Commissioner of Police in the Central District before moving to Arunachal Pradesh as a Superintendent of Police in 1992.

He swiftly rose up the ranks, serving in key positions in the Delhi Police, and has led and supervised several high-profile and sensitive investigations during his career. Among the most prominent were the Uphaar cinema fire tragedy, during which he was posted as Additional DCP, South. He also investigated the Ponty Chadha murder case and the Hansie Cronje match-fixing case.

He has been DCP of two districts in Delhi (Central and Northeast).

As Special Commissioner of Police, Technology and Project Implementation Division, he contributed to making significant progress in the Safe City Project and the Intelligent Traffic Monitoring System. He also introduced a QR-code-based feedback system for visitors to police stations and signed an MoU with IIT-Delhi for the Digital Trucking Radio System.

He served as Special CP, Law and Order (North), and launched the ‘Public Facilitation Desk’. He also ensured there were no communal riots in the district during his tenure.

As Special CP (Security), he played an instrumental role in handling security for the high-profile visit of then US President Barack Obama during Republic Day in 2015 and the Indo-Africa Summit attended by Heads of State and Governments of 54 countries.

He was also posted as Special CP (Intelligence).
Singh was also the Joint Commissioner (Crime Branch) and developed and launched the award-winning ‘Lost Report’ app. He also worked with the RBI to control circulation of fake currency notes and the security of ATMs.

As head of the Economic Offences Wing, he supervised an investigation on various land scams, bank frauds and cybercrime cases. He also worked with banks to introduce the OTP system to contain fraud.

During his tenure as DG Home Guard, he introduced a Rs 50 lakh insurance cover in cases of accidental deaths of volunteers. He further modernised the Home Guard recruitment system by introducing online application and RFID tests (computer-based written tests).

His wife, Sushi Singh, was part of the Police Welfare Society and headed several initiatives. They have two daughters, who are both based in the US.

Singh also authors a blog, titled ‘Spiritual Policeman’, offering insights into his unique perspective on law enforcement.

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