Days after a drug angle emerged in the Sushant Singh Rajput case, hotelier Gaurav Arya has denied the allegations levelled against him. Gaurav, in his conversation with Times Now, said that he never met the late actor and met Rhea three and a half years back. "I am being dragged into this case for no reason. I haven't had any contact with Rhea in the past three years. My family is being harrased. Gaurav's name cropped up in the investigation when the ED accessed Rhea's WhatsApp chats. Her messages to Gaurav from 2017 came to the fore in which the actress' message reads, "You have md?" Another message reads, "Incase we speak about hard drugs, I haven’t been doing too much. Tried MDMA once." Gaurav said that he is willing to cooperate with the authorities and is going no where.
The ED, which is probing a money-laundering angle into the death of Rajput, had also questioned Rhea and obtained "deleted WhatsApp messages" allegedly indicating dealings in banned drugs from her phone. Earlier in the day, a team has been formed and left from Delhi for investigation in the drugs-related matter in the Sushant Singh Rajput death case, Director General, Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) Rakesh Asthana said. The Narcotics Bureau has registered the case under various sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, 1985, including Section 27 which specifies punishment for consumption of any narcotic drug or psychotropic substance and 29 which provides for punishment in case of abetment and criminal conspiracy.