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NCP’s malik again attacks NCB, says using official’s friend as witness
The woman is one of Wankhede’s relatives and it needs to be checked if Patel and the woman had any connection with the raids on Bollywood celebrities, Malik said.
Maharashtra minority welfare minister and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Nawab Malik on Saturday again raised questions over the Narcotics Control Bureau’s (NCB) operations against the alleged drug peddling pertaining to Bollywood. He claimed that the central agency has used a man named Fletcher Patel, who is a family friend of its zonal director Sameer Wankhede, as a panch or witness in three different cases in the past two years.
Malik shared a few documents on Saturday and raised doubts on the agency’s witnesses. By releasing pictures from social media, Malik said Patel was Wankhede’s family friend. He has alleged that Patel had shared a photograph with a woman, calling her ‘lady don’ with hashtag ‘Sister’. The woman is one of Wankhede’s relatives and it needs to be checked if Patel and the woman had any connection with the raids on Bollywood celebrities, the minister said. He also alleged that the woman in the photograph is an advocate and an office-bearer of the film cell of a political party.
“An independent panch or witness needs to be an independent citizen in any case registered under any law. Fletcher is a family friend of Wankhede as he has shared a picture with the relative of the officer. Fletcher is also seen with Wankhede in many functions organised to felicitate the officer. Does this not raise questions over the veracity of the cases registered by the agency? Earlier, the courts had rapped the investigating agencies on such dubious witnesses as they weaken the cases,” Malik said.
He said as many of the NCB raids were against Bollywood actors, it needs to be checked if there was any nexus involved in it.
“How can a family friend be a part of the raids? The agency has been indulging in selective leaks related to the raids to defame the government and the film industry. Many actors were raided and paraded by the agency. It needs to be checked if there was any big game behind all these raids,” he said.
Earlier, in two press conferences in two weeks, Malik had alleged that two witnesses in the cruise drug party raids were allowed to handle the accused. He had said one of the witnesses, KC Gosavi, is facing criminal cases, while another, Manish Bhanushali, is a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) officer-bearer. Malik had also alleged that his son-in-law, Sameer Khan, was framed in a drug case.
Wankhede refused to comment on Malik’s allegations.
Another NCB officer said that Patel is the Mumbai president of Army veterans’ group Sainik Federation and has an Army background. The photograph in which he is seen with Wankhede was an event held at CSMT where the federation had felicitated the NCB zonal director on Kargil Vijay Diwas on July 26. At the event, they pledged to curb the menace and threat of narcotics from the country.
The officer further said that Patel is a highly-trustworthy person. “As a panch, we always require people like him who have army background, because such individuals are physically and mentally strong, and especially are of very help in operations against peddlers/suppliers who are strong in physique,” the NCB officer said.
Patel said, “I am an ex-serviceman and Mumbai president of Sainik Federation. Yes, Sameer Wankhede’s sister is like an elder sister to me. Even if she is like family to me, that can’t stop me from helping NCB in their drive against drugs. I have been helping NCB as my social responsibility and nobody should question my integrity. “
