A court in Mumbai on Tuesday rejected actress Rhea Chakraborty’s bail plea in the drugs case and remanded her in judicial custody till 22 September.
“She has been sent to jail up to 22nd of this month. Her bail application has been rejected. She will stay here (in NCB office) today and will go to the jail tomorrow morning,” Special public prosecutor Atul Sarpande told the media after the hearing, as quoted by ANI.
The Narcotics Control Bureau had demanded a 14-day judicial custody for Rhea for allegedly procuring drugs for late actor Sushant Singh Rajput.
Earlier in the day, the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), after three days of intense grilling, arrested actress Rhea in connection with its ongoing probe to unravel the drugs nexus in the film industry, officials said. The actress has been charged under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act for her alleged role in the drugs angle that has emerged during investigation into the 14 June death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput.
Meanwhile, Rhea has in her statement to the NCB accepted her role in procuring drugs for late actor and also handling the finances. “During her statement, Rhea Chakraborty revealed about her involvement in procurement of drugs and financial transactions and also her instructions to Samuel Miranda, Dipesh Sawant and Showik Chakraborty,” NCB said in its application for judicial custody for 14 days for Rhea.
“Therefore it is clear that the respondent is an active member of drug syndicate connected with drug supplies. It is also clear from the statement that the present respondent used to procure drugs for Sushant Singh Rajput for consumption purpose. The present respondent used to manage finance for drug procurement along with Sushant Singh Rajput,” NCB said in the application.
Rhea is likely to be presented by the NCB before a court for her remand, while her legal team prepares to get her bailed out.
Reacting to the development, Rhea’s lawyer Satish Maneshinde termed the arrest a “travesty of justice” in a scathing statement targeting the family of Sushant. “Three central agencies hounding a single woman — just because she was in love with a drug addict, suffering from mental health issues for several years under the care of five leading psychiatrists in Mumbai, who ended up committing suicide due to consumption of illegally administered medicines and used drugs,” Maneshinde said.
Her much-anticipated arrest came a day after Rhea took time out — at the height of the NCB interrogation sessions — to hit back at the late actor’s family by lodging a police complaint against Sushant’s sister Priyanka Singh and Dr Tarun Kumar of RML Hospital in New Delhi and others, alleging forged medical prescriptions.
A Mumbai Police spokesperson said that the complaint has been lodged with Bandra Police under the Indian Penal Code and the NDPS Act, and in line with the Supreme Court orders, the case has been transferred to the CBI for investigation.
Rhea’s arrest came three days after her brother Showik Chakraborty, Sushant’s home manager Samuel Miranda, and his house helper Dipesh Sawant were arrested and sent in NCB custody till 9 September, besides two other drug peddlers Abdel Basit Parihar and Zaid Vilatra, who are also in NCB custody.
The NCB had earlier said that with these arrests, it hopes to “uproot the drugs citadel in Bollywood and Mumbai” amidst talk of several other Bollywood personalities coming on the agency’s radar.