HC refuses to quash FIR against SSR’S kin

MUMBAI : The Bombay high court (HC) on Monday refused to quash the first information report (FIR) registered by Bandra Police on September 7, 2020, against Priyanka Singh, the sister of the late actor Sushant Singh Rajput, on the basis of a complaint lodged by Rajput’s girlfriend, actor Rhea Chakraborty.

Chakraborty alleged Singh sent SSR a prescription with medicines containing psychotropic substances controlled under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985. A division bench of justices SS Shinde and MS Karnik, however, quashed criminal proceedings against the late actor’s other sister Meetu Singh, after finding that there was no material against her.

Their counsel Madhav Throat said Singh will now move the Supreme Court, challenging the HC judgment.

As per Chakraborty’s complaint, Singh had, on June 8, 2020, sent Rajput prescriptions given by Dr Tarun Kumar, a cardiologist attached to Dr Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital in Delhi without examining the actor, and the consumption of the psychotropic substances in the prescribed medicines “may have caused and contributed to the actor’s suicidal death”. The sisters moved HC for quashing of FIR, claiming the statements made in it did not make out any cognisable offence. Their petition stated that lodging of the complaint by Chakraborty was nothing but a feeble attempt on her part to scuttle investigations against her by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) and blame Rajput’s family for his suicide.

Chakraborty’s counsel advocate Satish Maneshinde had urged HC to allow the probe into the allegations, contending that in a case of abetment to suicide, proximate reasons are most important and as the actor allegedly ended his life six days after the prescription, it could be the most proximate reason.