New Delhi, May 17 The Delhi High Court on Wednesday provided protection to Sameer Wankhede, the former Zonal Director of the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) of Mumbai, stopping his arrest in the Aryan Khan bribery case for five days.
Justice Vikas Mahajan passed the order on a plea filed by Wankhede.
"Consequently, Wankhede will not be required to appear at the CBI office tomorrow (on Thursday) for statement recording and and no coercive action to be taken against him until May 22," the court said.
The interim relief from the high court comes as a respite for Wankhede, who sought protection against any adverse action.
In addition to this, the court has directed Wankhede to approach the Bombay High Court for further legal proceedings.
Wankhede has been accused of trying to extort Rs 25 crore from the family of Aryan Khan - the son of superstar Shahrukh Khan, through other members of the NCB and a few individuals. Later on, the amount was reduced to Rs 18 crore, and a token amount of Rs 50 lakh was reportedly paid.
DDG, NCB, Gyaneshwar Singh had submitted a report to the CBI on the basis of which the probe agency has lodged a case.
Singh had handed over the report to the CBI to file a case against Wankhede, then NCB Superintendent V.V. Singh, and then IO of the case Ashish Ranjan.
Wankhede, an IRS officer who is currently in DGTS Chennai, will have to appear before the CBI's Mumbai zone office to get his statement recorded.
His cell phone was earlier seized by the CBI to retrieve data from it.
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