Ananya Panday to be questioned today by NCB in Mumbai cruise drugs case

Mumbai: Actress Ananya Panday will be questioned for the third time by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in connection with the cruise drug bust case involving Shah Rukh Khan's son Aryan Khan.

After grilling her on Thursday and Friday, the NCB has summoned the actress for the third time today for questioning on the basis of two-year-old WhatsApp chats found on Aryan Khan's phone, details of which had earlier been leaked by the anti-drugs agency.

The NCB had earlier reportedly seized her laptop and two mobile phones.

Agency sources have indicated she was called in again because her answers are unsatisfactory.

Ms Panday is being questioned by NCB officer Sameer Wankhede - who is leading the investigation - on chats that seem to indicate that in 2018-19 she thrice helped Aryan Khan procure drugs.

However, the actor has denied supplying drugs in the indicated mobile phone conversations; she told NCB officials she has never consumed or supplied banned narcotics, sources added.

Ms Panday was questioned on two separate occasions last week for a total of six hours.

Ananya Panday, the daughter of actor Chunky Panday, made her Bollywood debut in 2019 and is among the rising younger generation of stars in the Hindi film industry.

A NCB official said the agency is not, at this stage, treating the actor as anything other than a "part of the investigation"; "... just because she is summoned doesn't mean she is a suspect," the official said.

Aryan Khan and several others were arrested on October 3, a day after they were detained following a drugs raid on a cruise ship anchored off the Mumbai coast.

No drugs were found on him; the case is based entirely on information from his WhatsApp chats.

The agency has claimed these chats indicate he was in touch with an international drugs cartel.

Aryan Khan has been in jail since October 8, and he has been denied bail after heated hearings in lower courts. He has now applied to the Bombay High Court, which will hear his plea tomorrow.