'Snoopgate' IPS officer GL Singhal gets Gujarat government posting

AHMEDABAD: Suspended IPS officer GL Singhal, an accused in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case and the cop at the centre of Snoopgate controversy, has been reinstated by the Gujarat government. Singhal, who has been posted as SRP commandant in Gandhinagar, is learnt to have reconciled with the Gujarat government.

"I received the orders on Wednesday and will join within the next two days. This is my second innings as a police officer and it will not be like the first one," Singhal, currently out on bail, told TOI.

Audio recordings of telephone conversations of 2009, purportedly between him and the then junior home minister of Gujarat Amit Shah, had sparked off a major controversy putting the Narendra Modi government in the dock for alleged snooping on a woman architect.

After his arrest by CBI on February 21, 2013 for his involvement in the fake encounter case, Singhal handed over these recordings to agency's officers. The audio recordings were later released by two web portals which said their authenticity could not be confirmed.

The Modi government had set up Sugnya Bhatt Commission on November 26, 2013 to probe the allegations after it came under attack from opposition parties and civil society groups.

Pandian, Chudasama next in line?

Singhal is the second tainted IPS officer to be reinstated. Another IPS officer Dinesh MN, who was arrested in connection with the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case of 2005, got bail earlier this month and was quickly reinstated by the Rajasthan government.

Gujarat police sources said two other IPS officers of from the state --Abhay Chudasama and Rajkumar Pandian — are also likely to be reinstated soon. Pandian got his bail from the Supreme Court while Dinesh and Chudasama recently got bail from Bombay high court.