Mumbai: Terming the voluminous 12,000-page charge sheet filed towards Bollywood actress Rhea Chakraborty, her brother Showik and 31 others as “expected”, their lawyer Satish Maneshinde launched a pointy assault on the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), nearly accusing it of a witch-hunt, right here on Saturday.
“All efforts of the NCB have been directed in the direction of Rhea Chakraborty, to in some way rope her in. The whole NCB, from high to backside was engaged in unearthing the drug angle in Bollywood,” Maneshinde mentioned.
“The charge sheet is a damp squib standing on the foundation of inadmissible evidence and statements recorded under NDPS Act Sec. 67 even after the Supreme Court judgement in the Toofan Singh case. Without Rhea Chakraborty being charged, this case has no substance,” Maneshinde mentioned.
Referring to the NCB’ contentions in the charge sheet that it has seized varied narcotic drugs (Charas, Ganja, LSD, Ecstasy) and psychotropic substances (Alprazolam and Clonazepam), the lawyer rubbished the federal drug company’s claims.
“The entire amount of ‘Narcotic Substances’ recovered against the 33 accused are nothing compared to what even a Constable in Mumbai Police or Narcotics Cell or the Airport Customs or other agencies recover from one raid or trap,” Maneshinde identified.
Moreover, he mentioned there’s hardly any materials towards any identified faces, who had been paraded through the investigations, and puzzled whether or not the allegations had been false, or “only God knows the Truth”.
The lawyer added that even the Bombay High Court didn’t discover prima facie materials on the stage of bail of the ‘alleged’ financing of drugs commerce, as claimed by the NCB.
Maneshinde’s robust reactions got here a day after the NCB lodged its charge sheet — a 11,700-page plus extra in digital format — with the Special NDPS Court in Mumbai, signalling an finish to the probe.
The NCB got here into the image in August 2020 after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) came upon the drugs facet of its probe into the monetary angles surrounding the dying of Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput on June 14 at his rented duplex in Bandra, Mumbai.
Besides Rhea and Showik, the NCB has named the late actor’s ex-manager Samuel Miranda, his home assist Dipesh Sawant, a drug peddler Anuj Keshwani from whom a industrial amount of drugs like LSD sheets and Marijuana) had been first recovered.
Also figuring in the charge sheet are two foreigners — actor Arjun Rampal’s South African girlfriend and mannequin Gabriella Demetriades, her brother Agisilaos Demetriades, apart from Kshitij Prasad, a former government producer with Dharma Productions, and two collegians, mentioned to be the last-mile peddlers.
“We will have the last laugh Satyameva Jayate,” an unfazed Maneshinde concluded.
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