Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Oct 26: Even as the bail plea of Aryan Khan, the 23 year old son of the Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan, is kept pending before the Bombay High Court, two other accused in the drugs-on-the-cruise case were granted conditional bail on Tuesday while the Narcotics Control Bureau agreed to investigate one of its own officers charged with corruption.
A five-member team from the vigilance section of the NCB will go to Mumbai on Wednesday to investigate the allegations against Sameer Wankhede, the zonal officer in charge of the drugs case involving Aryan Khan and others. He was charged by one of the witnesses of taking a bribe of Rs eight crores to settle the drugs on cruise ship case.
The agency has ordered a vigilance inquiry into the bribery allegations made against the officer by a man named as a witness in the case. Wankhede is also facing a series of allegations from Maharashtra minister Nawab Malik that range from extortion to illegal phone tapping and cornering quota meant for Scheduled Castes through forged documents. Tweeting a letter with 26 allegations, Nawab Malik has been insistent that the officer be investigated. Earlier in the day, the NCB Deputy Director General Mutha Ashok Jain had said they would take necessary action in the matter.
Wankhede has filed an affidavit in the court refuting the minister’s allegations. After the bribery allegations by case witness Prabhakar Sail, he also wrote to the Mumbai police, alleging he is being framed. In a letter to Mumbai Police commissioner Hemant Nagrale, he sought protection from likely legal action “being planned” against him by unknown persons to “falsely frame him concerning an alleged vigilance-related issue.”
Prabhakar Sail — who claims to be the personal bodyguard of private investigator KP Gosavi — has alleged that his boss had planned to demand ₹ 25 crore from Shah Rukh Khan’s manager to settle the case against his son Aryan Khan who was arrested in connection with the cruise ship case. Gosavi said they should ask for a “bomb 25 crore” and then settle at 18 crore, of which ₹ 8 crore was for Sameer Wankhede, Prabhakar Sail had said in his affidavit.
He had also alleged that Sameer Wankhede had made him sign several sheets of blank papers. Sources said the NCB team would go to Mumbai tomorrow under the leadership of senior agency official Gyaneshwar Singh.
Meanwhile, Manish Rajgaria and Avin Sahu, two of the 20 accused in the cruise case were granted bail from the special NCB court hearing the case on Tuesday. The bail plea of Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan is pending before the Bombay High Court, which would continue the hearing on Wednesday.
Manish Rajgaria, accused number 11 in the case, was arrested in possession of 2.4 grams of ganja. He was released with a bond amount of ₹ 50,000. Avin Sahu was accused of consuming contraband twice. They were arrested as the cruise ship returned to Mumbai.
Unlike the case of Aryan Khan, there was no WhatsApp or iMessage chats in the case of Manish Rajgaria, his lawyer argued. His lawyer, Ajay Dubey, had also argued that there was no progress in the investigation against him. The detailed order in the matter is awaited. Avin Sahu’s lawyer Sana Ali Khan “I have been able to show the difference between the cases of the other accused and my client.”
Denied bail twice before, Aryan Khan has been lodged at Arthur Road jail in Mumbai for over 20 days. While denying him bail last week, the court said he knew about charas hidden in his friend Arbaaz Merchant’s shoe, which amounted to “conscious possession.” Former Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi, who argued for Aryan Khan, said the lower court erroneously arrived at the conclusion about conscious possession as “Aryan Khan had no control over Arbaaz Merchant and Arbaaz was not an employee of Aryan over whom he had control — which is a key criteria in determining conscious possession.”
Rohatgi also argued that no drugs were recovered from Aryan Khan’s possession and there was no consumption. So there was “no need to arrest” him, said the senior lawyer. The case against him, Rohatgi said, was based on old WhatsApp chats that had nothing to do with the cruise ship raid and so, was irrelevant. The NCB has contended that the WhatsApp and iMessage chats of Aryan Khan were incriminating and it was essential to question him to track the international drug cartel involved.
