The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) on Saturday told a metropolitan magistrate court that it needed custodial interrogation of Rhea Chakraborty’s brother Showik as he used to facilitate drug deliveries.
The central agency which arrested 24-year-old Showik Chakraborty on Friday told the court in its plea for remand seeking five days custody that it needed to confront him with the arrested accused who are in its custody presently as well as Rhea and Dipesh Sawant - Sushant’s personal staff.
Zaid Vilatra and Abdel Basit Parihar who had been arrested by the agency on 2 September and 3 September respectively, are in the agency’s custody for investigation.
Regarding the need to confront Showik with Rhea and Sawant, the NCB said that “there are specific ingredients of criminal conspiracy, abetment and various attempts to commit offences.”
Further, it told metropolitan magistrate NN Joshi that there are some “characters” who are to be verified and that as per the CDR analysis, WhatsApp chats and preliminary interrogation these individuals are “deeply entrenched in drug trafficking” which is a serious threat to public safety and health.
The application for custodial interrogation filed by the agency’s intelligence officer K Kiran Babu also stated that Showik used credit card, payment gateways and cash for payments for the contraband and that there are a few “characters” who are absconding and yet to be uncovered.
Showik was arrested by the agency on the disclosure of 23-year-old Abdel Basit Parihar and has been booked under several sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act. Parihar himself was arrested on the statement of Zaid Vilatra who had told the agency that Basit had received drugs from him. Basit had in his statement to the agency said that he had procured drugs from Zaid and Kaizan Ebrahim on the instructions of Showik Chakraborty and got them delivered to Samuel Miranda - Sushant’s house manager, again as per Showik’s instructions.
Both Zaid and Basit have retracted their statements the day they were produced before the magistrate court and said that the statements had been forcefully extracted and not voluntary.
The NCB also produced Miranda along with Showik and got both their custody from the court till 9 September. Kaizan Ebrahim, who was also produced by the agency has been sent to jail or judicial custody by the magistrate for 14 days.
The agency had not sought his custody. Immediately thereafter, Ebrahim applied for bail through his advocate Ashwin Thool and was granted bail.
