NCB fabricated evidence to frame my husband: Nilofer Malik in second open letter

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In the second instalment of her open letter released to the media on Tuesday, Nilofer Malik Khan, daughter of Maharashtra Cabinet Minister Nawab Malik alleged that the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) fabricated evidence to frame her husband Sameer Khan.

She also explained the trouble and trauma she and her children went through after Sameer Khan was arrested by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) in an alleged false case.

Following is Nilofer Malik Khan's open letter as obtained by mid-day.

After hours of turning our house and office upside down, the NCB found nothing but the media kept sensationalising the news. The reporters outside my building were reporting or rather making drama with headlines like "Contraband found in Sameer Khan's house", "NCB taking legal action", etc. Amidst all this chaos I chose to patiently let the NCB do their work and not retaliate, although every second I felt like screaming and saying that we are innocent. I remember feeling helpless and numb! 2-3 days later I was on crutches due to my foot injury. I was allowed to meet Sameer daily post 5pm since the media would leave by that time.

The elevators at NCB office used to stop working after 5 pm because of which I had to climb up and down on crutches with a fractured leg to meet my husband. At that time, it seemed to be the smallest of our problems. On one of the days while I was sitting in the NCB office, a police officer said 'Aapko bhi summon Karke bulayenge', to which I said 'Aap mujhe kya bulayenge, mein toh roz aati hu, kya puchna hai, puchiye." He smirked and said 'Nahi, nahi hum toh media bulake aapko bulayenge'.

Sameer was in PC (police custody) and then went to JC (Judicial Custody).

When we approached session's court for his bail application, the NCB tried to get the court to reject his bail by saying that the investigation is still on and the accused can tamper with the evidence. I personally spoke to Sameer Wankhede asking him to arrest other people who were actually involved in these cases, the real culprits. He said, ‘Unhone bahot safai se sab kiya hai.' He claimed that he will be filing the charge sheet soon but that never happened.

After the Sessions Court rejection we went on to the High Court, after a lot of struggles we managed to get a date in the High Court. But unfortunately, the date was again postponed because of the second coronavirus wave and only emergency cases were being looked into. We had to again wait for three more months for the High Court to start taking the normal hearings. Finally, when we got the date, the NCB very smartly said that the charge sheet will be coming out in a few days and because of which the High Court asked us to go back to Sessions court and expedite the matter. The charge sheet was out in July, only after which we were able to apply for a date in Sessions Court. Each time we got a date, NCB's public prosecutor would come up with reasons to not show up.

That he wasn't available and wouldn't be present for our court hearings. This went on for two long months.

While the bail hearing kept getting pushed, the NCB released another fictional news of a Rs 5 lakh transaction between Sameer and Karan. This was completely fabricated and there was no such transaction at all. When I asked my lawyer about this he said it is a case of ‘sheer mischief' from NCB. NCB manipulated chats between my husband and my brother in law to come up with fake evidence about the transaction. I was in utter trauma in these 8 months. My kids, their school fees, EMI's, policies, all had to be taken care off, but my bank accounts were frozen. People alienated me and my family for long and I couldn't even go out of the house for months. Occasions, festivals, anniversaries passed by and I kept telling my kids ‘Dadda' will come home, don't worry.

My 10-year-old son started looking online, reading news about his dad being dragged into this fake peddling allegation. He bought a jail model toy and said "Mumma Batman will release all innocent people" Batman will release my Dadda, don't worry. My kids would get up at night and start crying asking ‘when will Dadda come back'? They would spend half the day with my sister as I wasn't home to take care of them while I was running from pillar to post to get someone to help us. Sameer and I have been married for 12 years. We stayed together for 12 years. He was my backbone, I was his backbone, I've lived and spent so much time with him. Suddenly my go-to person went missing. I fought for him to survive, the fight was there to get him out, the fight was there to prove ourselves innocent and get rid of the stigma we suddenly had upon ourselves.I've sat in courts for 8 to 9 hours just to get dates. It was mentally and physically exhausting. People started recognising me, sympathising with me saying everything will be fine and in those times even these small gestures meant a lot.

I have seen people from the department saying that this is a fake case, but they were also helpless about it as there was external pressure involved.