Drugs case: Producer seeks discharge, says SIT needs to re-investigate

“The said Officer had an intention to gain media attention by destabilising and invoking fear in Bollywood.”

Mumbai: In his plea seeking discharge from the drugs cases registered by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), film producer Kshitij Prasad called for re-investigation by a special investigation team (SIT) into the entire drugs case, in which actor Rhea Chakraborty and her brother Showik were arrested along with 33 others.

Executive producer Kshitij Ravi Prasad outside Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in Mumbai, India, on Saturday, November 07, 2020. (HT PHOTO) (Hindustan Times)

“It is important to note that the investigation in both the aforesaid cases was carried out by an overzealous and over-ambitious officer,” Prasad said in his plea filed through advocate Nikhil Maneshinde, referring to the then NCB zonal director Sameer Wankhede.

“The said Officer had an intention to gain media attention by destabilising and invoking fear in Bollywood.”

It further said that the “said Officer” wanted the 30-year-old, who has started his own production house, Spark Kreation, to falsely name certain film directors, producers, actors and actresses as consumers/suppliers of drugs.

“Various prominent actors and actresses were made to visit the Respondents (NCB) and give their statements. The outcome of such investigation has still not been produced before this Hon’ble Court. The said Officer is currently being investigated for shoddy investigation in the case involving Aryan Khan. It is, therefore, the prayer of the Applicant, that in the present case as well, a Special Investigation team be formed, and the whole case be re-investigated,” the plea added.

Prasad, who has worked as executive producer with Karan Johar’s Dharma Production, was first arrested by the NCB on September 26, 2020, and a special NDPS (the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985) court on November 29, 2020, granted him bail.

Before he could come out on bail, he was rearrested by the same agency in another drug case on November 5, 2020. On December 15, 2020, the NDPS court also granted him bail in the second case.

According to his plea, the agency had allegedly found a rolled joint believed to be smoked marijuana, weighing approximately 0.3238 grams, on the balcony of Prasad’s residence. Apart from the used joint, the agency had relied on several WhatsApp chats to book him for various drug-related charges.

Prasad in his plea maintained that his was “a case of absolutely no evidence” and referred to the case of Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan, who was exonerated by SIT for want of cogent evidence.

“Pertinently the said Complaint (in the charge sheet filed by NCB in Aryan Khan case) makes references to various WhatsApp chats of Aryan Shah Rukh Khan regarding procurement and consumption of drugs and yet the Respondents (NCB) rightly chose not to prosecute him, as obviously statement of an accused recorded under the NDPS Act and the WhatsApp chats are, by their own showing, inadmissible (as evidence),” Prasad’s plea said, claiming that the 30-year-old too was entitled to be discharged.

“The Applicant states that he has never consumed drugs in life. As a matter of fact, he was not even medically examined for consumption of any narcotic substance,” Prasad said in his plea.

“No drugs were recovered from his person. There is no evidence that he ever indulged in purchase, sale, possession, store, distribution or trafficking of drugs,” the plea added.