Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Thursday granted bail to 23-year-old Aryan Khan, son of actor Shah Rukh Khan, his friend Arbaaz Merchant and Munmun Dhamecha, a model from Madhya Pradesh, in the case of seizure of drugs from a cruise liner on October 2. All of them have spent 25 days in custody.

Shah Rukh Khan (55) had tears in his eyes when he heard the news of his son’s liberty being secured, said senior counsel Mukul Rohatgi. He said Shah Rukh even made notes to assist the legal team.

The detailed order of the HC single bench of Justice Nitin Sambre, with conditions of bail and the amount for surety, would be out on Friday. This meant the three would spend another night in jail.

Additional solicitor general Anil Singh, who appeared for the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), argued for over an hour where he opposed the bail pleas, saying, “Aryan Khan is a regular consumer of drugs. There is evidence to prove that he has been providing drugs.”

Singh said, “It was a party. My learned friend is saying why we have arrested on October 2 on Gandhi Jayanti… The arrest was not invalid. The order of remand was never challenged on grounds of illegal arrest, so far. Not even one of the three remand orders of the magistrate was challenged, now belatedly they cannot say arrest is illegal.”

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Mumbai: The HC on Thursday granted bail to Aryan Khan, Arbaaz Merchant and Munmun Dhamecha in drugs seizure case.

At the hearing of the bail plea of the trio, senior counsel Amit Desai, appearing as lead counsel for Merchant, along with advocate Taraq Sayed, had on Wednesday termed the very arrests as “illegal’’ as no notice under Section 41A of Criminal Procedure Code was issued to first seek an explanation since alleged recovery of charas was small and attracted less than a year’s punishment.

Singh said tampering cannot be ruled out as “the affidavit by a witness named a person”. He did not name the person himself, though he was referring to Prabhakar Sail’s affidavit in which he has alleged a Rs 8 crore payoff to an NCB official and mentioned Pooja Dadlani, Shah Rukh Khan’s manager.

The NCB stressed again that Khan and Merchant were together and Khan was in “conscious possession”, and that he was connected with peddlers and the entire case is one, which cannot be dissected, and it is of commercial quantity. When the judge asked on what basis the agency had found Khan dealing in “commercial quantity”, the NCB referred to his WhatsApp chats. “The grounds of arrest were shown within four hours of arrest. Four hours cannot be called a delay. Besides, conspiracy is difficult to prove. It is only the conspirators who know how they have conspired. We have WhatsApp chats which we will place on record.”

Rohatgi, brought in from London for the HC hearing, then started his rejoinder to argue why NCB arguments ought not to be accepted. He argued for about 15 minutes and after mid-submission, the judge said he had heard enough. He tossed the three applications towards his staff and said, “All three applications are allowed.” It was around 4.45 pm. The courtroom was packed, with other lawyers too. The suddenness of the pronouncement took many by surprise.

Khan’s advocate Satish Maneshinde then sought permission to submit cash bail, which the court refused, and said it has to be a surety. “I could have also given the order tomorrow. But I gave it today,” Justice Sambre said. He said the detailed order assigning reasons would come later.

Khan is presently in judicial custody and lodged at Arthur Road prison. The legal team will now try to complete the formalities for his release by Friday itself or Saturday, once the operative part is out, depending on the time the order copy is out.

Rohatgi in his rejoinder said, “Aryan and Arbaaz were together. But the most important thing put against us is commercial quantity being recovered from others. While the ASG refers to Section 37 (provision making bail tough) of NDPS Act by referring to commercial quantities being recovered, Section 27A (the serious offence of illicit trafficking and financing of drug trafficking) is not invoked against them,” he pointed out. Both Rohatgi and senior counsel Amit Desai had on Wednesday argued that the arrest memo did not mention their arrest was for any conspiracy but that offence was inexplicably shown in the first remand application on October 3.

“What is argued against me is what has been found on five others, which if you total up, will amount to commercial quantity. Aachit Kumar, whom NCB called a dealer, was arrested four days later with 2.5 grams. Can he be a dealer? Their case is that since they were there it is a case of conspiracy, but the conspiracy is a meeting of minds. Apart from Arbaaz none of the other accused have any connection with me, and there were 1,300 people in the cruise,” Rohatgi said.

Rohatgi said, “It is the greatest travesty of justice if Article 21 (right to life and liberty) is not examined at the time of bail.”

The three were arrested on October 3 and booked under relevant sections of the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act for possession and consumption after 6gm charas was allegedly found on Merchant’s shoes and 5gm from Dhamecha’s cabin floor. Both had denied the recovery, and Khan’s case was that there was nothing found on him at all, yet he was arrested and alleged to be part of a “larger conspiracy” by the NCB.

Meanwhile, after the day’s proceedings, solicitor Raian Karanjawal from Delhi, engaged by his school junior, Shah Rukh Khan for the HC bail hearing, said, “I interacted with Shah Rukh Khan before the matter, when he asked me about Mukul Rohatgi before the HC bail plea, and after bail was granted, over the phone. He thanked us. My daughter, part of the legal team interacting more frequently, found him well versed with all the facts, measured in the approach, not excitable as a lot of clients are in such situations and very balanced to talk to. He was also familiar with aspects of the case.”

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