Maharashtra / Sameer Wankhede's father files ₹1.25 crore defamation suit against Nawab Malik

Mumbai: The father of Narcotics Control Bureau’s (NCB) Mumbai zonal director Sameer Wankhede has reportedly filed a defamation suit against Maharashtra minister and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Nawab Malik in the Bombay high court and sought ₹1.25 crore in damages. 

According to a report in India Today, Wankhede’s father Dhyandev Kachruji Wankhede wants a permanent injunction restraining Malik and others “acting under his instructions” from publishing, writing or speaking in the media about the family. Malik is scheduled to hold a press conference later in the day.

The suit reportedly states the Maharashtra minister has done “irreparable loss, damage, harm, prejudice to the name, character, reputation and societal image of plaintiff and his family members”, besides destroying the practice of the senior Wankhede's daughter Yasmeen, a criminal lawyer who has nothing to do with the case.

Malik has levelled several allegations against Wankhede, who was recently removed by the NCB from heading the sensational drugs-on-cruise case in which Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan is an accused. He was also in-charge of a case in which Malik’s son-in-law Sameer Khan is involved.

Among the several charges that the cabinet minister has brought against the NCB officer are extortion and fraudulent use of caste card to obtain his job.

The NCB has also initiated a vigilance probe against Wankhede even as it stated that the move to shift the six cases from Mumbai team to its Delhi unit was only an administrative decision.

Wankhede had earlier moved the high court stating that he was being personally attacked by the Maharashtra government. The court had, however, disposed of his petition for an arrest shield after the state told the bench that its inquiry was still at a preliminary stage and it would give the officer a three-day notice before taking coercive action against him.