Pak boat case: Coast Guard DIG Loshali who contradicted govt version shunted out

Ahmedabad: The Coast Guard DIG BK Loshali, who had contradicted the government’s version on the explosion on board a Pakistani vessel, has been removed as the Chief of Staff at Northwest region and attached to their zonal headquarters. [caption id=“attachment_2119323” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Coast Guard DIG BK Loshali.[/caption] This has been done as a Board of Inquiry (BoI) is on against him to establish the facts. “This is a routine procedure. Since a BoI is on, he has been attached to the zonal headquarters in Gandhinagar as per standard operating procedure,” Coast Guard sources said. Indian Express also reported that the inquiry board will be headed by a senior officer of DIG rank and will collect inputs from the people who were on duty at the time of the incident, according to a Defence Ministry official. “Based on the final report submitted by the BoI, the action on DIG Loshali could either be disciplinary or administrative,” Indian Express quoted the official as saying. BoI has been ordered against him by the Coast Guard after they found his reply “unsatisfactory” to a showcause notice on his remarks that he had ordered blowing up of a Pakistani boat. Loshali had contradicted government’s claim last week that the crew on an intruding Pakistani boat had set it ablaze. In an exclusive report, the Indian Express quoted Deputy Inspector General of the Coast Guard, BK Loshali, saying that he was there at Gandhinagar and he had ordered officials to ‘blow the boat off’ as opposed to government’s he claim that the boat had blown itself up under suspicious circumstances. “Let me tell you. I hope you remember 31 December night. We blew off the Pakistan…We’d blown them off…I was there at Gandhinagar…and I told at night: blow the boat off,” Loshali had in the video. Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, the Ministry and the Coast Guard had maintained that when the boat was chased on the intervening night of 31 December and 1 January by Coast Guard ships, four men on board had set it ablaze. The Coast Guard has said “suitable action will be taken on receipt of the proceedings of the Board of Inquiry”. (With inputs from PTI)