Central NCB team led by Sanjay Kumar Singh to head case involving Aryan Khan

A series of allegations against NCB zonal officer Sameer Wankhede has prompted the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) to transfer the drug case involving Aryan Khan, son of Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan, along with 5 other cases to the Special Investigation Team (SIT), headed by IPS officer Sanjay Kumar Singh.

Sameer Wankhede, who heads the Mumbai zone of the NCB, was accused by Maharashtra minister and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Nawab Malik of bribery, extortion, lying about his religion, forging his documents for a government job and the arrest of high-profile people in petty drug cases. Wankhede's extravagant personal lifestyle has also been brought up several times by various parties

Even though Wankhede and NCB officials have denied that these charges led to the transfer of the case NCB to the Special Investigation Team, headed by Sanjay Kumar Singh, an offcer close to the case developments told Firstpost that the idea "behind shifting these sensitive cases is to see them in a completely transparent prism of facts and evidence. The Central Unit will avoid unnecessary controversy around high-profile cases like Aryan Khan's."

As these cases have "wider and inter-state ramifications", they have been transferred to the operations unit in Delhi, NCB Deputy Director General (north-west region) Mutha Ashok Jain told PTI on Friday

Also Read: Sameer Wankhede raised 'private army' for drug peddling, accuses Nawab Malik

The NCB operations unit has a pan-India jurisdiction and it is currently headed by DDG Sanjay Kumar Singh. He is an Indian Police Service (IPS) officer of the 1996 batch Odisha cadre. He also served in the Odisha Police and the Central Bureau of Investigation.

The 2010 Commonwealth Games scam was investigated by a team supervised by Singh, during his stint with the CBI. During his time with the Odisha Police, he was the Additional Director General and headed the Drug Task Force (DTF) that busted numerous drug trafficking rackets in the city of Bhubaneshwar. Several anti-drug campaigns were also carried out by him in the state.

According to media reports,Singh headed the Drug Task Force (DTF) of the Odisha Police as Additional Director General (ADG) before joining the NCB and launched anti-drug drives in the state, busting several drug rackets in Bhubaneshwar. Prior to that, Singh also worked with the CBI and supervised the investigation into the 2010 Commonwealth Games scam, according to an NDTV report.

Singh has been appointed to head the SIT team in 6 cases including the drug case involving Aryan Khan, along with other cases linked to Bollywood personalities as well. Apart from this, Singh will also handle the case of Armaan Kohli, who was arrested for possession of 1.3g of cocaine, on August 28.

Also Read: Aryan Khan case transferred to NCB headquarters; Sameer Wankhede 'not removed' from the case

Sameer Wankhede, however, clarified on Friday that he has not been removed from the investigaton. "I have not been removed from investigation. It was my writ petition in court that the matter be probed by a central agency. So the Aryan (Khan) case and Sameer Khan case are being probed by the Delhi NCB's special investigation team. It's a coordination between NCB teams of Delhi and Mumbai," he told news agency ANI.

Further, NCB mentioned in their statement that no officer has been removed from their current roles. The statement read that they will continueto assit the operations brand investigation as required until any specific orders are issued. “It is reiterated that the NCB functions across India as a single integrated agency,” the statement added.

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