India's anti-drug unit has arrested three people, including a man allegedly linked to the ongoing drug probe launched after Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s suicide, an official revealed to Sputnik on Monday.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, a senior Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) official shared that Maharaj Shah and two foreign nationals have been arrested following raids in the coastal state of Goa on Sunday.
"Shah is one of the key peddlers who used to supply drugs to Rajput", said the official, adding that large quantities of drugs have also been seized as part of the operation.
The raids were part of a joint operation conducted by officials of the Maharashtra and Goa units of the NCB.
In June 2020, Sushant was found hanging from a ceiling fan at his Mumbai flat. The death triggered a massive debate on the functioning of Bollywood, and later the consumption of drugs involving several big names of the industry was exposed.
The NCB has been tasked with probing the allegations of drug abuse linked to the death of Sushant Singh Rajput.
Last year, after Sushant's death, his father K.K. Singh filed a complaint with Patna Police against his son's ex-girlfriend Rhea Chakraborty, her parents, and her brother Showik.
Singh accused them of taking money from Sushant’s accounts and playing a possible role in abetting the actor’s suicide.
India's premier investigative agency CBI was tasked with the probe by the country's apex court on 19 August. It was done following Rhea’s request to the court to transfer the case from Bihar Police to Mumbai Police. Sushant originally hailed from India’s Bihar state, but he was living in Maharashtra state’s Mumbai city after becoming a Bollywood actor.
Following the complaint in Bihar by the deceased actor’s father K.K. Singh, Rhea approached India's apex court with a request to transfer the case to Mumbai Police from Bihar state.
However, following the recommendations of the Bihar state government on the request of the actor’s father, the case was handed over to the federal probe agency, the CBI, by the Supreme Court.
Simultaneously, the country's economic intelligence agency, the Enforcement Directorate (ED), registered a money laundering case based on Singh's complaint after finding suspicious transactions worth $2 million (INR 150 million) from Sushant's bank account.
During the ED’s probe, evidence of possessing, purchasing, and using cannabis in the case was found, following which the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) also joined the case.
Several top celebrities have also been questioned by the NCB in the case.