Sushant Singh Rajput drugs case: Court directs 8 accused to give voice samples to NCB

Over two years after the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) moved a special court under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS) for getting voice samples of eight accused in the drugs case connected to late actor Sushant Singh Rajput, the court has directed them to give the samples.

The agency had approached the special court with the plea in Jan 2021, after a landmark ruling in the Supreme Court held that statements to officers under Sec 67 of the NDPS Act would be inadmissible as evidence.

Case relying on voluntary confessions

The case relies heavily on such statements which are in the form of "voluntary confessions". Apart from this, the chargesheet had cited voluminous digital data in the form of Whatsapp chats. The plea for voice samples was to confirm and prove identities of accused persons in the voice calls that the agency has recovered.

Those directed to give voice samples are - Anuj Keshwani, Regal Mahakaal, Kshitij Prasad, Sanket Patel, Abbas Lakhani, Zaid Vilatra, Chris Costa and Karamjeet Singh. The court directed that they appear before the agency for the purpose as and when it directs them. While some of these are drug peddlers, one is alleged to be a supplier.

The court had directed the accused to file their responses to the plea. The NCB's special public prosecutor Atul Sarpande said the decision on the plea got delayed as the accused were on bail and delayed in filing their responses and so on.