Sameer Wankhede, accused of 'shoddy' probe in Aryan Khan case, transferred

Sameer Wankhede, the anti-drugs officer pulled up for 'shoddy' investigations into the drugs-on-cruise case involving actor Shah Rukh Khan's son Aryan Khan, has been transferred to Chennai.

He has been posted to the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence as the Director General of Taxpayer Service Directorate, a 'non-sensitive' posting.

Wankhede, on deputation to the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), was the Zonal Director of the unit's Mumbai office when he raided a Cordelia cruise ship off the Mumbai coast and arrested Aryan Khan and 22 others in a drug case last October.

Amid allegations of corruption against him, the case was transferred from the Mumbai zone to the central team of the NCB. Wankhede was removed from the case and a vigilance probe was initiated against him.

Last week, the NCB cleared all drug charges against Aryan Khan, saying that they had no evidence to prosecute the star kid. The Director General of the NCB said that action would be taken



against officers for lapses in the investigation and for not following procedure.

NCB Deputy Director-General, Sanjay Singh, said there was an error by the first probe team led by Sameer Wankhede, after which the anti-narcotics agency cleared Aryan Khan in the Cordelia drugs case.

The officer made headlines with the high-profile case that saw the arrest of Aryan Khan and his friends, among others. Soon after the NCB clean chit to Aryan Khan, the Union Home Ministry called for appropriate action against Wankhede for his "shoddy investigation" into the Mumbai cruise drugs bust, government sources told India Today TV.

At the peak of his probe into the cruise-drugs case, Wankhede was accused of furnishing fake caste certificates to get a job under the Scheduled Caste quota after clearing the UPSC examination by Nawab Malik, then a Cabinet-level minister in the Maharashtra government. However, Sameer Wankhede and his family have maintained that the allegations are false.