Won't arrest Sameer Wankhede without giving prior notice: Maharashtra govt tells Bombay HC | Updates

Kiran Gosavi, arrested by Pune City Police on charges of cheating, has been sent to police custody for 8 days by a city court. Gosavi is a witness in drugs-on-cruise case involving actor Shah Rukh Khan's son Aryan

The Maharashtra government told the Bombay High Court on Thursday that it will not arrest NCB's zonal director Sameer Wankhede without giving him a prior notice of three working days, in connection with the allegations of extortion and corruption levelled against him.

Narcotics Control Bureau Zonal Director Sameer Wankhede approaches Bombay High Court over "apprehensions that Mumbai Police may arrest him." The arguments on the matter is being heard by the Division Bench of Bombay HC

Maharashtra minister and NCP state chief Jayant Patil on Thursday claimed that the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) was being used to "harass and defame" citizens. Speaking to reporters in Ratnagiri, he also said that party leader and state minister Nawab Malik, who has levelled various allegations against NCB's Mumbai zonal director Sameer Wankhede, was "bringing out the truth". "The NCB is being used for defaming, harassing and putting people behind bars for longer period...this has happened with Aryan Khan and many others. It has to be probed thoroughly," Patil said. 

Kranti Redkar Wankhede, the wife of NCB's Mumbai zonal director Sameer Wankhede, wrote a letter to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Thursday, seeking justice in the wake of the attack on her family and her personal life. She posted the letter on her Twitter handle and tagged it to the Maharashtra CMO.

Amitabh Gupta, Commissioner of Police, Pune City, said that there is no such demand yet from Mumbai Police or any other agency to handover Kiran Gosavi to them. "Kiran Gosavi has been arrested in a 2018 cheating case. A charge-sheet was filed in the case in 2019. If we get more complaints against him, we will register fresh offence against him," Gupta said.

Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut said that an inquiry has to be done. It's not as if an inquiry is not done if someone has Z plus security. Those who point fingers at the Maharashtra government and does crooked work here are felicitated with Z plus security. You would have seen that they are given Z plus security. I won't point fingers at anyone but Maharashtra is a safe state. Everyone here is safe. It seems Centre has a lot of security forces to spare, if people are given security like this. They should send them (forces) to Kashmir, Arunachal instead.

The NCB Vigilance Team will record statements of witnesses which include NCB officials and some outsiders. Yesterday, the team had recorded the statements of two persons apart from Sameer Wankhede.

"I don't have to say anything," says Sameer Wankhede, NCB Zonal Director, after being questioned by NCB yesterday over allegations made against him by Prabhakar Sail, who is a witness in the drugs-on-cruise matter of Mumbai.

In the ongoing serial revelations, Nawab Malik on Wednesday morning posted a wedding photo of Sameer Dawood Wankhede's first marriage with Dr Shabana Quraishi and a copy of their 'nikaah-nama' of 2006, and charged the officer of using forged documents to grab a reserved quota job in the IRS.

Continuing the war against the NCB Zonal Director Sameer Wankhede, Nationalist Congress Party Minister Nawab Malik on Wednesday accused the officer of alleged links with the international drug mafia and demanded a probe. Malik claimed that during the October 2 raid on the party aboard the luxury ship Cordelia Cruise at the International Cruise Terminal, there was one "bearded man" present in the alleged party, who is a former jailbird with stints in Delhi's Tihar Jail and a Rajasthan prison.

Pune police have detained Kiran Gosavi, an independent witness of the NCB in the drugs-on-cruise case, in connection with a 2018 cheating case registered against him here in Maharashtra, officials said on Thursday.  Gosavi, said to be a "private investigator" whose photos and videos with actor Shah Rukh Khan's son Aryan Khan went viral on social media after the NCB's raid on the cruise ship off Mumbai coast on October 2, had been absconding. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE

At least four complaints lodged against Wankhede in different police stations in Mumbai will now be handled by the ACP who will investigate and prepare his report in the matter. "We have started the probe. This is a very sensitive investigation, too early to share anything. We shall inquire all aspects and later inform the media of the developments," NCB vigilance team member Dnyaneshwar Singh said.

Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) vigilance team and an ACP-level Mumbai Police officer have launched independent probes into the allegations of 'extortion' and other issues against the NCB Zonal Director Sameer Wankhede, on Wednesday. The NCB team arrived in Mumbai last afternoon and is understood to have recorded Wankhede's statement besides summoning a 'Panch-Witness' Prabhakar Sail for probe.

The Mumbai Police on Wednesday constituted SIT to investigate the allegations against the NCB officer and Maharashtra Minister Nawab Malik. In Mumbai, at least 4 separate complaints have been lodged against the NCB officer on various counts, which the ACP level officer will investigate.