Kiran Gosavi, NCB's 'independent witness' in Aryan Khan drug case, detained in Pune

Kiran Gosavi, the controversial 'independent' witness of the Narcotics Control Bureau in the Mumbai drugs-on-cruise case, involving Shah Rukh Khan’s son — Aryan Khan — has been detained in Pune.

"Kiran Gosavi has been detained," said Pune Police Commissioner Amitabh Gupta on Thursday.

Gosavi has been detained by the Pune Police three days after he claimed he would surrender at a police station in Uttar Pradesh's Lucknow.

Catch the live updates from Aryan Khan's bail hearing

Who is Kiran Gosavi?

Gosavi made headlines when a selfie of him with Shah Rukh Khan's son Aryan, reportedly clicked at the NCB's office, had gone viral.

Gosavi has been called a witness in the NCB raid on the cruise ship off the Mumbai coast on 2 October. NDTV reported that Gosavi, a private investigator, was present during the cruise ship raid earlier this month and later at the Narcotics Control Bureau or NCB office with Aryan Khan.

His presence had fuelled questions from Maharashtra's ruling alliance about the anti-drugs agency's investigation.

A case has been registered against Gosavi with the Faraskhana police station of Pune city on 19 May 2018, for allegedly committing fraud by promising a person a job in Malaysia by taking money. However, he neither returned the money nor offered the job to the complainant.

Other than this, a case of fraud has been registered at the Kelwa Police station in Palghar on 18 October. As per the police, he had duped people of lakhs on the pretext of sending them abroad for jobs.

Meanwhile, Prabhakar Sail, who claims to be Gosavi’s personal bodyguard and another witness in the cruise drug case, said he heard Gosavi having a telephonic conversation about pay-offs with one Sam D’Souza.

Sail claimed he heard Gosavi say they should ask for a "bomb Rs 25 crore" and then settle at Rs 18 crore, of which Rs 8 crore is for the NCB's zonal officer in charge of the investigation, Sameer Wankhede.

Gosavi has refuted these claims and added that he doesn’t know Wankhede at all.

Aryan Khan’s bail hearing to resume

Aryan Khan’s bail hearing in the Bombay High Court will resume today after it adjourned the hearing on Wednesday.

The hearing, which began on Tuesday before the single-judge bench of Justice Nitin W Sambre, saw the lawyers of Aryan and co-accused Arbaaz Merchant and Munmun Dhamecha present their case.

Senior advocate Amit Desai and former Attorney General for India, Mukul Rohatgi are representing Aryan.

After the hearing which went on for over two hours, Justice Sambre said he would hear Additional Solicitor General Anil Singh, who is representing the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), tomorrow.
"Tomorrow we will try to finish it," the judge said.

With inputs from agencies