The Bombay High Court has dismissed the drugs case registered in 2016 against former Bollywood actress Mamta Kulkarni. The court said that the proceedings against him were clearly frivolous and vexatious and that continuing with them would amount to an abuse of the process of the court.
A division bench of Justices Bharti Dangre and Manjusha Deshpande, in an order passed on July 22, said it was of ‘unequivocal opinion’ that the material collected against Mamata Kulkarni does not prima facie make out any offense against her. According to PTI, a copy of this order of the High Court was made available on Wednesday.
The bench said in its order, ‘We are satisfied that continuing the prosecution against the petitioner (Mamata Kulkarni) would amount to abuse of the process of the court.’ The court said it is satisfied that this is a fit case to exercise its inherent powers to quash the FIR as the proceedings are clearly frivolous and vexatious.
Mamta Kulkarni had filed a petition in the court in 2016 to quash the FIR registered against her by Thane Police under various provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act. In which Mamta had claimed that she had been implicated in this case and she was familiar with only one co-accused, Vicky Goswami.
In fact, in April 2016, the police had arrested two persons for alleged possession of one kilogram of a drug called ephedrine. After preliminary investigation, a case was registered against 10 more persons including Kulkarni. The prosecution case is that Kulkarni along with other co-accused including Vicky Goswami had held a conspiracy meeting for sale and purchase of narcotics in a hotel in Kenya in January 2016.
The bench perused the statements of witnesses and other evidence presented in the charge sheet and found that a meeting for the alleged conspiracy took place in the dining hall of a hotel in Kenya and where Mamata was sitting on a sofa next to the dining table. The court said that it believes that the material presented in the chargesheet is not sufficient to sustain the charge framed against Mamta Kulkarni under the provisions of the NDPS Act.
The bench said, ‘The mere presence of the petitioner (Mamata Kulkarni) at one meeting, even admitting the material shown in the charge sheet, is certainly sufficient to sustain the conviction under the provisions of the charge sheet. It won’t happen.