Sharma had faced a lot of flak from members of the public and their representatives for converting the Kalaghoda-Kothi road via Aradhana cinema and Telephone Exchange-Kalaghoda road via Baroda Automobiles into one way lanes during peak hours in the morning as well as evening. Though the traffic diversion, which claimed one life recently, is still continuing, a writ petition has been filed in the court by a group of advocates.

Sharma with his no-nonsense image, was able to make his subordinates -- up to the level of constabulary -- toe his strict disciplinarian line of wearing uniform during duty hours and attend parades regularly. Some of the middle rank officials had initially resisted morning parades, which had been long given up in Vadodara, but Sharma managed to suppress the undercurrent of resentment and was able to make all submit to this dictates.

Sharma had also asked some assistant commissioners of police to follow discipline strictly by asking them publicly to wear badges meant for their status and not the ones of their superiors. Though the ACPs in question had been wearing the badges meant for their superiors during the reign of previous CPs as well, no one had dared to raise any objection. The task of enforcing discipline is the most challenging assignment for the new incumbent, besides tackling crime and the law and order situation.

Sharma also recently reopened several murder cases, which took everyone by surprise. He was also successful in arresting two more accused in the killing of a middle-aged tribal in Bathujinagar on the outskirts of the city under the Jawahar Nagar Police station. This had raised eyebrows as lower level officials had allegedly tried to hush up the case for certain considerations.

Another `baby' of Sharma, launched with great fanfare and media hype, which has yet not been implemented, is the FOPS intended for healthy public-police relations. Sharma had single-handedly succeeded in enlisting 870 FoPS from all 13 police station areas of the city for assisting the police in day-to-day policing and traffic matters.

A training programme for about 550 FoPS drawn from eight police stations was also conducted last Sunday. Sharma had also ordered printing of 1500 FOPS application forms for enlisting 300 more volunteers.

Though Mahapatra, soon after his arrival in Vadodara, pledged to continue all the schemes launched by Sharma with the same vigour and spirit, it will nevertheless be a herculean task for him as he has been away from the field work for quite sometime. Citizenry had pinned great hopes in Sharma's FOPS project for checking crime.