Plea Against NCB, CBI Top Brass for False Allegations Against Sameer Wankhede in Aryan Khan Drug Case Filed at Bombay High Court
A petition filed by IRS officer Sameer Wankhede to dismiss the alleged bribery case brought against him in connection with the Aryan Khan drug case has been filed in the Bombay High Court asking for a directive to prosecute NCB’s top officer Gyaneshwar Singh and other officials of the anti-drug agency and the CBI for allegedly preparing forged records and filing false and misleading affidavit before it.
In the case filed by Wankhede demanding action against the authorities under section 340 of the Criminal Procedure Code, attorney Ishwarlal Agarwal submitted the plea for intervention. He argued that the fact that the FIR for extortion and bribery was filed in haste and without recording the actor Shah Rukh Khan, Pooja Dadlani, or others’ statements and that the CBI intended to arrest Wankhede is ample evidence of their malfeasance.According to the Supreme Court’s ruling in Union of India vs. Ram Lakhan Sharma (2018), the NCB investigation is tainted because it is being led by Gyaneshwar Singh, who is also a witness in the case.
“The NCB’s investigation is being led by Gyaneshwar Singh, who is a witness in the case, and as a result, the investigation is tainted, in accordance with the Supreme Court’s ruling in Union of India vs. Ram Lakhan Sharma (2018). As a result, the FIR that the CBI filed based on the tainted NCB inquiry report is equally tainted. According to the Supreme Court’s and the High Court’s rulings, the CBI was required to undertake a preliminary investigation before filing a FIR because the matter involved a public employee, it said.
The intervention application also questioned whether Shah Rukh Khan, Pooja Dadlani, and Aryan Khan should have been charged with giving a bribe, which is a crime under Section 12 of the Prevention of Corruption Act and Section 202 of the IPC, if the CBI found the version of NCB to be prima facie correct. “The sound proofs, chats, and audio/video recordings given by Wankhede were never disputed by the CBI or NCB and are sufficient proofs of the mala fide of NCB officials and Gyaneshwar Singh that forged record is created to save Aryan Khan from serious charges of drug consumption and another conspiracy,” it claimed.
Aryan Khan’s worldwide drug connections to buy large quantities of drugs and his conversations with famous children like Navya Naveli Nanda and others were also not the subject of the desired probe. It stated that this was sufficient evidence to infer the bad intentions of NCB officials. According to the law, the CBI is required to conduct a fair investigation, look into Sameer Wankhede’s account, and bring charges against Aryan Khan, Gyaneshwar Singh, and others. The intervenor further requested that the High Court impose severe penalties, up to and including Rs 5 crore, on CBI and NCB for defending their actions on the basis of frivolous and illegal justifications and therefore wasting the court’s valuable time. He also claimed that the CBI’s action in asking for a restraint order against Wankhede to prevent him from disclosing chat messages and interviews was unfounded because no evidence had been presented to show any harm or inaccuracies in the information provided to Wankhede. He was seeking further investigation against Aryan Khan and others.
The court’s decision in Naresh Shridhar Mirajkar v. State of Maharashtra (1996), which was rendered by a nine-judge panel of the honourable Supreme Court, was allegedly violated by this, according to the statement. On May 11, 2023, the CBI allegedly filed a FIR based on Shahrukh Khan’s alleged demand for Rs 25 crore following the arrest of his son Aryan in a case in 2021. The FIR was filed after more than one and a half years on a blatantly false motive with ill will to harass him, according to Wankhede, the head of the investigation team, who filed a petition in the High Court for its quashing. The investigation was carried out under the direct supervision and control of his seniors on an hourly basis, he claimed. He added that the Mumbai police had already looked into similar allegations and ended the case.
