NDPS court unfreezes bank accounts of Rhea Chakraborty, family

The freeze happened in 2020 during the investigation into the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput, in which a murder and drug angle was brought in

MUMBAI: A special Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) court in Mumbai has held that the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) failed to comply with a mandatory statutory safeguard while freezing four bank accounts linked to actor Rhea Chakraborty and her family, and ordered that the accounts be unfrozen and permitted to be operated.

NDPS court unfreezes bank accounts of Rhea Chakraborty, family

The freeze happened in 2020 during the investigation into the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput, in which a murder and drug angle was brought in. Chakraborty, Singh’s ex-girlfriend, was implicated but received a clean chit from the CBI last year.

In a set of four orders passed on Saturday, the court found that the agency did not secure confirmation of the freezing action from the competent authority within the time prescribed under the NDPS Act, rendering the restraint legally unsustainable. Allowing the applications filed by Rhea, her brother Showik and her mother Sandhya, the court held that the statutory framework places clear limits on the power to freeze property, and those safeguards had not been followed in the present case.

“Sub-section (2) of Section 68 F of the Act provides that an order of freezing or seizing the property shall have no effect unless it is confirmed by the competent authority within 30 days of its being made,” special judge U C Deshmukh noted, recording that the prosecution did not dispute the absence of such confirmation.

Holding this lapse to be fatal, the court added that in the absence of the statutorily required order, “the application is liable to be allowed”, and directed that the accounts be unfrozen and permitted to be operated in accordance with RBI rules.

In reaching this conclusion, the court relied on a Bombay high court ruling emphasising that the power to freeze property is not unregulated and must be exercised in line with constitutional protections. Quoting the precedent, the order noted that such powers require “reason to believe” that property is illegally acquired and must be followed by prompt reporting and confirmation, failing which the action becomes “nugatory”.

The prosecution had opposed the pleas, pointing to statements attributed to the accused and alleging links with drug peddlers to justify the freezing of the accounts. However, the court did not examine the merits of those allegations, confining itself to the statutory defect in the freezing process and holding that non-compliance with the mandatory requirement was sufficient to invalidate the action.

The proceedings arise out of the NCB’s high-profile drug investigation launched in 2020 in Mumbai after the death of Sushant Singh Rajput. What began with seizures of small quantities of narcotic substances—primarily through disclosure statements—evolved into a wider investigation alleging a network involving procurement and consumption of drugs. Chakraborty and several others were later arraigned in the NDPS case, with the agency filing a chargesheet alleging a broader conspiracy.

The NDPS court order covers multiple bank accounts at ICICI Bank, Axis Bank and Kotak Mahindra Bank, and extends to co-applicants, including Rhea Chakraborty’s family members.