The Bombay High Court on Wednesday granted bail to actor Rhea Chakraborty in a drug case related to actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s death, Live Law reported. She has been accused of procuring drugs for Rajput. The Narcotics Control Bureau had called her as an “active member of a drug syndicate”.
She was arrested on September 8. The court granted her bail on a personal bond of Rs 1 lakh.
The High Court also accepted the bail pleas of Samuel Miranda and Dipesh Sawan, the domestic workers of Rajput. The court, however, rejected the bail pleas of Abdul Parihar and Rhea Chakraborty’s brother Showik Chakraborty.
The court directed Rhea Chakraborty to appear before her nearest police station every ten days after her release, She has also been restricted from leaving the country without the court’s permission and will have to deposit her passport with the investigating agency. The court further directed her to inform the investigating officer if she goes outside of Greater Mumbai.
Besides this, the court forbade the actor from meeting any other witnesses in the case, according to NDTV.
Similar conditions were imposed on Sawant and Miranda as well, who were released on a personal bond of Rs 50,000 each.
During the hearing, the Narcotics Control Bureau sought a stay on the order for a week. But the High Court declined the same and said that it had declared offences under NDPS Act were “non-bailable”. The bench added that stringent conditions have been imposed to ensure the actor cooperated with the investigation.
Minutes after Chakraborty was granted bail, the Mumbai Police warned the media against “chasing celebrities and others”, reported NDTV. The actor is set to walk out of jail on Wednesday itself.
“You cannot chase the vehicle of any celebrity, advocate or any person you wish to interview,” Mumbai Police Deputy Commissioner Sangram Singh Nishandar told reporters. “You cannot endanger your life, the life of that person or normal people walking on the roads. It’s an offence. We will take stern action, not only against the driver but against the person instigating, instructing the person to do such a chase.”
On September 29, the Bombay High Court had reserved its verdict on their bail pleas. During the hearing, the NCB had opposed their pleas, arguing that their alleged crime was “worse than murder or culpable homicide”.
Rhea Chakraborty made multiple serious allegations against the Narcotics Control Bureau and claimed she was “coerced into making self-incriminatory” confessions, which she has now retracted. She said she had “not committed any crime whatsoever and had been falsely implicated in the case”. Chakraborty is the ninth person to be arrested in the drug-related investigation into Rajput’s death.
Rajput was found dead in his apartment in Bandra on June 14, in what the Mumbai Police said was a case of suicide. On October 3, the All India Institute of Medical Sciences panel, which was in-charge of examining his autopsy reports, had ruled out that the actor was murdered and confirmed he died by suicide.
The case is already being looked into by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate. Several high-profile actors, including Deepika Padukone, Shraddha Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan, have also been questioned in the drugs case.
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