Lawyer of ‘key accused' says statement taken under duress

The total number of arrests in the cruise liner drugs seizure case went up to 16 as six more people, including four from the Delhi-based event management company Namas’cray Experience Private Limited, which had organised the two-day voyage, were arrested by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) on Tuesday.

- Ahmed Ali

Mumbai:

Namas’cray is a Delhi-based firm registered as Caneplus Trading Private Limited. The firm was established on 30 October 2020. The company was tasked with the management of the event on board Cordelia Cruises’ Empress ship.

The NCB on Tuesday produced four accused (including two who were arrested on Monday) — Abdul Kedar Shaikh, Shreyas Nair, Manish Rajgaria and Avin Sahu — before the 8th metropolitan magistrate and sought their custody. All the four were remanded to NCB custody till October 11. The four event organisers — Gopal Jee Anand, Samir Sehgal, Manav Singhal and Bhaskar Arora — will be produced before court on Wednesday. Sehgal and Anand are additional directors of Namas’cray. All the eight held earlier have been remanded to NCB custody till October 7.

The NCB on Tuesday added the stringent sections of 27 (A) for financing, 22 (b) (contravention involving quantity lesser than commercial quantity but greater than small quantity) and 22 (c) (where contravention involves commercial quantity) against Shaikh. The section pertaining to financing has also been invoked against Shreyas Nair.

While seeking custody of Shaikh, NCB public prosecutor Advait Sethna requested the court that they want minimum exposure of him as he is a key accused and investigations are on. Shaikh, whose face was covered with burkha, was whisked away by NCB officials. Shaikh’s lawyer later said his client wants to retract his statement as it was taken under duress. The NCB said it had recovered 2.5 grams of Ecstasy tablets and 54.3 grams of MD from Shaikh.