Former Supreme Court judge Shivaraj V Patil was on Tuesday appointed the new Lokayukta (Ombudsman) of Karnataka.
Patil, 71, will be in office for five years. He succeeds Santosh Hegde, who is retiring on August 2, after completing his tenure of five years.
Governor H R Bhardwaj on Tuesday accepted the recommendation of the state government and appointed Patil as the next Lokayukta.
The governor also appointed R Gururajan, former judge of the Karnataka High Court as the second Upalokayukta. Another former judge took over as Upalokayukta on July 19, 2010.
The state government had recommended the name of Patil after consulting leader of the opposition, Siddaramaiah, speaker of the state legislative assembly, K G Bopaiah, and Karnataka High Court Chief Justice J S Khehar.
Patil retired from the apex court in 2005. Early this year, he probed the procedures followed in allocation of telecom spectrum in 2001-09 following the 2G spectrum scandal. He submitted his report on January 31.
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Patil had also served as the chief justice of the Rajasthan High Court as well as acting chairman of the National Human Rights Commission.
Patil also served as the one-man committee that went into the processes and procedures followed by the Department of Telecommunications in the allocation of licences and spectrum between 2001 and 2009.
Justice Patil will occupy the hot seat as the office of the ombudsman is currently in the thick of the news following the investigation into illegal mining, which involves leading politicians, ministers and the chief minister of the state.
Justice Santhosh Hegde has successfully unearthed a series of corruption and land scandals involving the chief minister, several ministers of his cabinet and top bureaucrats. His second report on illegal mining, which is said to have indicted the chief minister B S Yeddyurappa, is likely to be submitted on July 27.