Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader and Maharashtra Minority Affairs Minister Nawab Malik’s security has been upgraded to Y+ category after he allegedly began receiving threatening calls following his press conference last week questioning the NCB’s probe into the Cordelia drug bust case. The son of actor Shah Rukh Khan, Aryan, along with several others have been arrested in the case.
Earlier, the NCP leader had been allotted an armed police guard for his protection but after the threats, his security detail has been beefed up. Under the Y+ category, an API or PSI-rank officer will be in charge of Malik’s security, along with four armed police guards and a pilot car will be stationed outside his residence at all times.
Last week, Malik had conducted a press conference questioning the presence of BJP functionaries during the raid on a luxury cruise liner along the Mumbai coast. Since the press conference, he had allegedly been receiving threat calls from different states.
While questioning the NCB, Malik had called the raid ‘fake’. The BJP had been conspiring to defame Maharashtra, the state government and Bollywood for the last one year, he alleged in the press conference.
Referring to the viral videos and some photographs, the NCB leader said that a person named K P Gosavi and another BJP worker, Manish Bhanushali, were seen bringing Khan and Merchantt to the NCB office respectively. Bhanushali was the vice-president of a BJP wing, Malik had alleged. A businessman from Thane, Bhanushali spends most of his time in New Delhi, with his social media profile showing him pictured with senior BJP leaders.
Following the controversy, the NCB had clarified that both of them were witnesses, along with seven others in the case and neither of the duo was known to the NCB earlier.
During the raid on the luxury cruise liner off the Mumbai coast on October 2, the NCB had arrested Aryan Khan and his friend Arbaaz Merchantt along with several others.
