A special court on Thursday granted an extension of 60 days to the Narcotics Control Bureau to file a chargesheet in the Mumbai cruise drugs case, involving actor Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan, Live Law reported.
On Monday, the narcotics agency had filed an application before a Mumbai sessions court, seeking an extension of 90 days to file a chargesheet in the case. It had told the court that investigation in the high-profile case was still ongoing.
Special Public Prosecutor Advait Sethna, appearing for the Narcotics Control Bureau, submitted that there were “compelling reasons” in the application to allow an extension to file a chargesheet, Live Law reported.
“The reasons include non-cooperation from the accused [persons] in giving their passwords, etc,” Sethna said.
Sethna further said that the investigating team is yet to record statements of 15 key suspects in connection with the case.
On October 2, Aryan Khan, his friend Arbaaz Merchant, model Munmum Dhamecha and five others were arrested by the Narcotics Control Bureau after a raid on a cruise ship off the coast of Mumbai.
During the raid, the agency claimed to have seized 13 grams of cocaine, five grams of mephedrone, 21 grams of charas, 22 pills of MDMA (ecstasy) and Rs 1.3 lakh from the ship.
On October 28, the Bombay High Court granted bail to three accused, Khan, Merchant and Dhamecha, and observed that there was no evidence of a conspiracy among them.
Notably, the order said that Khan had not carried any drugs during the raid, despite the Narcotics Control Bureau claiming in October that he had been found in “conscious possession” of contraband substances.
On March 2, several media reports had said that the Narcotics Control Bureau’s Special Investigation Team had not found any evidence that Khan was part of an international drug trafficking syndicate.
However, Narcotics Control Bureau’s Deputy Director General (operations) Sanjay Kumar Singh refuted the reports saying Khan was not cleared of any charges in the case.
“Media reports suggesting that the NCB had given Aryan Khan a clean chit are speculative and the investigation against him is still ongoing,” the NCB’s Deputy Director General (operations) Singh had told Scroll.in.
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