Bombay High Court Refuses Bail To Armaan Kohli In Narcotics Case

The court, however, granted bail to alleged consumers Kareem Dhanani and Imran Ansari in a case being investigated by the Narcotics Control Bureau.

Justice Nitin Sambre passed the order soon after hearing arguments by the NCB and the petitioners.

The accused approached the High Court assailing rejection of their bail applications on October 14, 2021, by the Special NDPS Court.

Kohli was arrested on August 28, 2021 after the central agency searched his residence and allegedly seized 1.2 gm of cocaine (small quantity). The NCB had also seized Kohli's phone and claimed to have found incriminating evidence in the form of photographs and chats regarding an international drug cartel. There are seven accused in the case.

He is booked under Sections 8 (c) read with Sections 21, 22, 27, 27 (A), 28, 29, 32 (b) and 35 of the Narcotics Drugs a Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.

He was accused of financing illicit drug trafficking and harbouring.

In the HC, Kohli claimed that the NCB couldn't have relied on his WhatsApp chats and that a small quantity of contraband was recovered from him. Therefore, the maximum punishment he could get was just a year. Section 27A of the NDPS Act was also not attracted, he argued.

Senior Advocate Aabad Ponda for Kohli gave the example of claiming to murder someone on WhatsApp and how unreliable such evidence would be.

However, the NCB represented by Additional Solicitor General Anil Singh and assisted by Special Public Prosecutor Shreeram Shirsat, argued that Kohli's role is established in the commission of offences since there was proof and chats of his financial transactions.

Moreover, based on his statement, a Nigerian peddler -Sam Isreal- was arrested with commercial quantity. There were several drug-related chats, too, he argued.

Kohli is allegedly connected with accused no. 1 - Ajay Singh - who is a big-time drug peddler. The NCB relied on Kohli's WhatsApp chats to show corresponding financial transactions.

While a detailed copy of the bail order is yet to be made available, the Special NDPS court observed the following while rejecting Kohli's bail application in October.

The Special Court had said that rigours of Section 37 under the NDPS Act would apply against Kohli. The actor not just received messages regarding drugs but also responded to those messages. Moreover, prima-facie Kohli appears well connected with the co-accused to make out ingredients of Section 27A of the NDPS Act, the court had added.

"Although the investigation is at a nascent stage and is under progress, the said chats if corroborated with the bank transactions match approximately with the figures held under transactions and therefore the factum of connivance in prima-facie cannot be negated, " the court observed while refusing him bail.

It had been noted that Kohli failed to show he had objected to such WhatsApp chats being sent to him.

"Therefore, I find no substance in this argument and the factum of connivance apparently can be drawn. Contents in the chats and videos also propagate for the indulgence of the applicant in illicit trafficking in prima-facie. Therefore, the prosecution seems to have invoked section 27A against the applicant/accused. Thus, in view of the same the rigours of Section 37 are duly attracted and this fact ipso-facto disentitle the applicant/accused from any such relief of enlargement on bail," the court had said.