Once a flamboyant inspector in the crime branch, Jagdish Sail has been dealt with another blow, after the murder of his protégé, police informer Avinash Solanki alias Bali. Yesterday, he was shunted to the preventive branch. A source said Sail's closeness with Bali, who was a close friend of a drug supplier, had raised the eyebrows of the officer's seniors.

Bad company
Highly-placed sources told mid-day that Sail was sidelined after his photograph with Bali, who was brutally killed in Andheri East, allegedly by his friend Nilesh Shukla, embarrassed senior IPS officers. "As per the order, I have been temporarily attached to the preventive branch. I don't know the reason behind this," Sail told mid-day. The source said, "A decade ago, Shukla was arrested under the NDPS Act. It was Bali who got him bailed out, and they became friends."