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Sameer Wankhede — the Narcotics Control Bureau officer leading the investigation into the Aryan Khan drugs case, and against whom allegations of a ₹ 8 crore payoff and extortion have been made — has been removed from the investigating team.
“Total six cases of our zone will now be investigated by Delhi teams (of NCB), including Aryan Khan’s case and five other cases.
“It was an administrative decision,” Mutha Ashok Jain, Deputy DG, South-Western Region, NCB, said on Friday.
According to CNN-IBN report, When contacted, Wankhede seemed to downplay the development and said that the move was in line with his demand for a central probe in the Mumbai drug bust case. “I am still the Zonal Director of NCB Mumbai. A writ petition was filed by me in the high court for an independent probe by a central agency, and now a senior officer has been appointed. Cases in which I had problems have been handed over. The other cases are still with the NCB,” he said.
NCB Deputy Director-General (northern region) Gyaneshwar Singh is conducting a departmental vigilance probe into allegations of extortion made in the drugs-on-cruise case in which Wankhede and his team had arrested actor Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan and seven others on October 3 from the international cruise terminal in Mumbai.
Meanwhile, Maharashtra minister and NCP spokesperson Nawab Malik, who has consistently levelled multiple allegations against Wankhede recently, tweeted, ‘Sameer Wankhede removed from 5 cases including the Aryan Khan case. There are 26 cases in all that need to be probed. This is just the beginning… a lot more has to be done to clean this system and we will do it.’
Sameer Wankhede removed from 5 cases including the Aryan Khan case.
There are 26 cases in all that need to be probed.
This is just the beginning… a lot more has to be done to clean this system and we will do it.— Nawab Malik نواب ملک नवाब मलिक (@nawabmalikncp) November 5, 2021
