Mumbai Court Defreezes Chakraborty Family Accounts

A special court in Mumbai ordered the defreezing of bank accounts belonging to actor Rhea Chakraborty, her brother Showik Chakraborty, and their mother Sandhya Chakraborty on Saturday, ruling that the Narcotics Control Bureau failed to follow required procedures under India's Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act. The accounts, frozen in 2020 as part of an investigation into alleged drug activities linked to the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput, can now be operated in line with Reserve Bank of India regulations.

The decision affects four remaining accounts, primarily joint ones held with ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, and Kotak Mahindra Bank. Earlier, in 2021, some of the family's accounts had been partially unfrozen, but the Chakrabortys filed fresh applications through lawyers Ayaz Khan and Zehra Charania to release these funds. The defense argued that the freezing was invalid because the NCB did not secure confirmation from a competent authority within the 30-day timeframe mandated by Section 68F(2) of the NDPS Act, which requires such oversight to prevent indefinite asset seizures.

Special NDPS Court Judge U.C. Deshmukh agreed, noting in the order that the provision...