Cordelia drug bust case: Locals cops in nexus with drug peddlers, says Arbaaz Merchant

Arbaaz Merchant, friend of Aryan Khan and accused in the Cordelia drug bust case, has said in his statement that forms part of chargesheet filed last week by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), that he is confident the local police station is in a nexus with residents of a Khar chawl who were into peddling poor quality drugs that damaged the health of teens.

26-year-old Arbaaz has said in his statement that he had tried to complain to the local police station about the problem, but to no avail.

His statement says that before the pandemic struck, he used to buy hash from Murugan Chawl behind Rajesh Khanna garden in Khar west. Arbaaz said that the residents of the chawl are involved in selling ‘all types of narcotic stuffs’ to teenagers. He said he learnt about the slum when he was in school and some of his classmates smoked weed from there. He says he had purchased from the area two to three times, but that the quality of the hash was “extremely poor”.

He goes on to say in his statement, “I have seen and heard a lot of stories of children falling ill and damaging their organs by consuming these laced drugs. I'm quite sure and confident the people at Murugan Chall are having a secret Partnership with the cops of the local police station as I have made an attempt to complain about it in May or June 2018 and no result or action came out of that.”

The statement also mentions that Aryan was aware that he is an occasional hash consumer and had told him not to carry the drug to the cruise as NCB was very active those days and that they could get into trouble. Aryan was exonerated along with five others from the case by the agency for lack of sufficient evidence.

Published on: Tuesday, May 31, 2022, 11:59 PM IST