In 2022, Wankhede, an IRS officer, was transferred to the DG Taxpayer Service Directorate in Chennai In 2022, Wankhede, an IRS officer, was transferred to the DG Taxpayer Service Directorate in Chennai In 2022, Wankhede, an IRS officer, was transferred to the DG Taxpayer Service Directorate in Chennai The CBI on Friday conducted searches at the premises of former NCB officer Sameer Wankhede after filing an FIR against him and four others for allegedly seeking Rs 25-crore bribe for not framing Shah Rukh Khan's son Aryan Khan in the drugs-on-cruise case, officials said.
Aryan Khan was arrested in an alleged drug bust case on the Cordelia cruise ship on October 2, 2021, they said. The Bombay High Court granted him bail on October 28, 2021.
The NCB, which had filed a charge-sheet in the drugs-on-cruise case, gave a clean chit to Aryan Khan, while an SIT set up by the anti-drugs agency claimed the probe led by Wankhede had lapses.
They said the searches were spread across 29 locations across Mumbai, Delhi, Ranchi and Kanpur.
It is alleged that IRS officer Wankhede and others had allegedly demanded Rs 25 crore bribe for not framing Aryan Khan in the alleged drug bust, they said.
The CBI received information that Rs 50 lakh was allegedly collected by the officer and his accomplice as advance, the officials said.
Wankhede, who headed the Narcotics Control Bureau in Mumbai at the time of Aryan Khan's arrest, was transferred to the Directorate General of Taxpayer Services in Chennai in May last year.
In 2021, Mumbai Police received four applications alleging extortion by Sameer Wankhede’ and other officials, following which they launched a probe to verify these claims.
One of the applications was sent by a witness named Prabhakar Sail. Prabhakar, who claimed to be the personal bodyguard of private investigator KP Gosavi, has alleged that he overheard Gosavi and Sam D'Souza, talking about a Rs 25 crore payoff to let off Aryan Khan in the case. "They were discussing that Rs 8 crore would go to NCB Zonal Director Sameer Wankhede," Sail told at a press conference. Gosavi is the same guy who’s selfie went viral with Aryan Khan after his arrest.
Sail also claimed that he saw Gosavi meeting Shah Rukh Khan’s manager and that he was asked to sign “9-10 blank pages” in the presence of Wankhede after the cruise raids.
Prabhakar Sail also said that there was a threat to his life from Sameer Wankhdede after KP Gosavi went suspiciously missing.
Sail then sent the application against the NCB officer to the Mumbai Police. “We have clubbed all the four applications filed against NCB officers including zonal director Sameer Wankhede. We have launched an enquiry to verify the claims," a senior officer said.
However, police refused to disclose the identity and contents of the application filed against the NCB officers back then.
NCB Deputy Director-General Sanjay Singh had also said there was an error by the first investigation, which was led by Sameer Wankhede, after the probe agency gave Aryan Khan a clean chit in the Cordelia drugs case.
With inputs from PTI