The Bombay High Court on Friday granted temporary relief to former Narcotics Zonal Director Sameer Wankhede by directing the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) not to take any coercive action against him till May 22 in a corruption and extortion case against him, after he gave an undertaking to appear before the CBI office on Saturday.
Mr. Wankhede, an Indian Revenue Service officer who was posted at NCB office in Mumbai, moved the Vacation Bench of the High Court on Friday, seeking protection from arrest in the case. The central agency had issued a summons to him. However, he did not appear before the CBI after the Delhi High Court granted him protection till May 22 in the same case and directed him to move the Bombay High Court.
Mr. Wankhede had come into the limelight following the high-profile October 2021 raids by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) on a Mumbai cruise after which the agency arrested Aryan Khan, son of actor Shah Rukh Khan, and 19 others and claimed to have seized some narcotics too.
The former zonal director of the NCB filed a First Information Report (FIR), alleging corruption and serious irregularities owing to which an “independent witness” in the cruise ship case had allegedly conspired with others to extort ₹25 crore from the family of Mr. Khan. The NCB alleged that as per the findings of its vigilance branch, Mr. Wankhede had not properly explained his foreign visits and had apparently misdeclared the expenditure on his foreign travels. He had also not declared the source of the foreign visits properly. Besides, he had indulged in selling and purchasing expensive wristwatches with a private entity, Viral Rajan, without intimating the authorities concerned.
However, Mr. Wankhede urged the court to quash the FIR against him by CBI, claiming that the FIR is an act of revenge, and sought a cross-FIR against NCB deputy director-general Gyaneshwar Singh.
