Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan was cleared in the drugs-on-cruise case by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) on Friday.
“SIT carried out its investigation in objective manner. The touchstone of the principle of proof beyond reasonable doubt has been applied. Based on the investigation carried out by SIT, a complaint (charge sheet) has been filed against 14 persons under various sections of NDPS (Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances) Act. Complaint against rest six persons is not being filed due to lack of sufficient evidence,” the NCB said in the statement.
“All the accused persons were found in possession of narcotics except Aryan and Mohak,” read a statement by senior NCB officer Sanjay Kumar Singh.
The agency could not find sufficient evidence against Aryan Khan and the five others, he said.
The anti-drugs agency has filed a 6,000-page chargesheet, naming 14 accused, after drugs were found in a raid on a cruise ship off Mumbai in October. Aryan Khan, 23, who was one of several people arrested, has not been named as an accused.
Earlier, the Narcotic Control Bureau had claimed Aryan Khan was a regular user and supplier of drugs. His lawyers had contended that no drugs were found on him during the raid.
The NCB’s arguments were questioned by a special court hearing the case, which said it could not just rely on WhatsApp messages to make such grave allegations.
Aryan Khan had spent more than three weeks in jail after he was arrested in the drugs case that dominated news headlines and polarised social media.
The officer in charge of the investigation, Sameer Wankhede, was dropped and faced allegations of deliberately targeting Aryan Khan and even trying to blackmail the accused.
The case was also transferred from a Mumbai-based team of the NCB to a Delhi-based team after irregularities and lapses in the probe emerged.
