The Bombay High Court on Thursday granted Aryan Khan, the son of Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan, bail three weeks after he was arrested in connection with a drug bust case onboard a cruise ship off the Mumbai coast on October 3.
A single bench of Justice N W Sambre also granted bail to his co-accused Arbaaz Merchant and Munmun Dhamecha. “All three pleas are allowed. I will pass detailed orders by tomorrow evening,” Justice Sambre said. The accused, however, will not be released from jail tonight.
Opposing Aryan’s bail plea during the HC hearing, Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) counsel ASG Anil Singh had said applicant Aryan Khan is not a first-hand consumer but a regular consumer of drugs for the last two years. He also pointed out that Aryan was found in ‘conscious possession’ of contraband. “There is a case that a person might not have consumed the drug, but if he’s in possession of it, he can be booked under NDPS Act… Accused Aryan was found in conscious possession of contraband,” Singh had argued.
On Wednesday, Senior Advocate Amit Desai, representing co-accused and Aryan’s friend Arbaaz Merchant, argued before the single-judge bench of Justice Nitin W Sambre that the NCB’s arrests in the case were “illegal” because the agency failed to follow procedure under section 41A of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC), which mandates the investigating officer to issue notice of appearance prior to arrest. Desai also contended that WhatsApp chats were not admissible in court, according to previous High Court judgments and provisions of the Indian Evidence Act.
Source: The Indian Express