Prabhakar Sail, a key witness in the cruise ship drugs case, in which Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan was arrested and later released on bail, has died of a heart attack.
As per his lawyer, he suffered a heart attack on Friday evening at his residence in Chembur, Mumbai.
Sail was the one who made extortion allegations against senior NCB officer Sameer Wankhede, who was later removed from the cruise ship case.
Sail had alleged that he was made to sign blank papers by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) after Khan was arrested. He had also said that Wankhede was aiming for a pay-off in the case.
In October last year, in an affidavit, Sail had said that he was forced to sign around 10 blank papers as a ‘panch’ or independent witness at the NCB office in Mumbai, in connection with the case.
Sail had further said that he was the personal bodyguard of Kiran Gosavi, the private investigator who was seen in the viral selfie with Aryan Khan at the NCB office. He had claimed that he was present in the car during a telephonic conversation between Gosavi and one Sam D’Souza, discussing monetary pay-offs to be paid to Wankhede, NCB Zonal Director, Mumbai Unit, and the officer leading the investigations in the cruise ship drugs case.
Wankhede had then been removed as the lead investigator of the case, and an SIT (Special Investigation Team), headed by senior IPS officer Sanjay Singh, was formed to probe the matter.
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Earlier, on October 3, 2021, Aryan Khan was taken into custody by the NCB after drugs were seized on board the cruise ship. His bail was rejected multiple times based on the agency’s claim that he had played a role in the illicit procurement and consumption of drugs. The NCB had also alleged that Aryan Khan was part of a larger conspiracy and had contacts with an international drug network.
The 23-year-old Khan was eventually granted bail by the Bombay High Court and he walked out of Arthur Road jail on October 30 after spending 26 days in custody. The investigation in the case is still underway.