SRINAGAR: A municipal court in this city on Tuesday granted bail to Kiran Patel, an alleged Gujarat conman who was detained in March for pretending to be a senior employee in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO). Anil Raina, one of Patel’s attorneys, informed that the chief judicial magistrate’s court in Srinagar had granted bail to the man being held in this city’s central jail. According to him, Patel was granted bail after posting a personal bond for Rs. 1 lakh and two locally responsible sureties for the same sum. Patel was represented in court by Mohammad Abdullah Pandit and Kaif Alam in addition to Raina. In March, Patel gained notoriety when he was detained in Jammu and Kashmir for impersonating a senior PMO official after videos of him moving around under security cover went viral. In Srinagar, Patel was detained by J-K Police after they discovered him inside a five-star hotel pretending to be a “additional secretary” for the federal government. During his stays in the Valley, he relished the security protection and other pleasantries. On March 3, security personnel detained him while he was making his third trip to Kashmir. Patel had asserted that the government had charged him with finding customers for apple plantations in south Kashmir.
