The October of 2021 was a tumultuous period for SRK and his family. At that time, the cops detained Aryan Khan, the superstar’s son.  This was over an investigation into an alleged international drugs racket. Aryan was behind bars for about 25 days at the Mumbai Central Prison and was denied bail four times. Finally, on October 28, 2021, SRK’s son received a bail. Subsequently, Aryan received a clean chit in May 2022. Aryan’s case was under Sameer Wankhede. He was the Zonal Director of the Narcotics Control Bureau at the time of the investigation. Wankhede faced accusations of financial and procedural inconsistencies and of only targeting celebrities.

During his conversation with Gaurav Thakur, Wankhede opened up about the accusation of targeting celebs. He said, “I don’t believe in the word ‘celebrity’, both personally and professionally. People see me as someone, who only gets hold of so-called celebrities, but they are not the only people I have handled. There are other 3400 cases that I have dealt with. Those don’t make it to the limelight because those people don’t have face value or the charm to become headlines. I only did my duty. It’s not my fault if people write headlines around certain people.”

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When probed about the ‘elephant in the room.’ Aryan Khan’s case, Wankhede dismissed as a minor case of his career. Further, he refrained from commenting fully on the matter. “I don’t agree that it is the ‘elephant in the room’, I would rather think of it as one of the smallest cases of my career–a microorganism in the room. I don’t want to give it so much importance, or waste my time talking about it.”

He added, “The matter is currently in the court and I don’t want to comment on it. I just want to say, neither am I scared of anything, nor am I hiding anything. The only reason I avoid talking about it is because I have given an affidavit in court that I will not speak about the case. There is a lot to share and talk, but there is a code of conduct, due to which I can’t discuss. Once the court will pass its verdict, I will surely speak about it in detail.”

Meanwhile, during the investigations, alleged chats between SRK and him leaked online. In the messages, the actor requested the closing of Aryan’s case. Following Aryan receiving the clean chit, SRK delivered back-to-back hits in 2023. Notably, his dialogue from the blockbuster film ‘Jawan’ stirred netizens. The dialogue, “bete ko hath lagane se pehle, baap se baat kar. (Before touching the son, deal with his dad)” was seen as a dig at Wankhede.

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Commenting on this, the officer said, “I don’t want to take names and make them famous. As far as the leaked chats are concerned, I will repeat myself that I am not allowed to comment on it. Whatever dialogue is seemingly used against me… with the words, baap, beta, they sound extremely cheap and third-rated. We don’t use such words in a cultured society. These are simply roadside dialogues. I don’t expect myself to give importance to such things and react.”

Moving ahead, Shah Rukh Khan’s next is Sujoy Ghosh’s ‘King.’ The film also stars Abhishek Bachchan and Suhana Khan. Meanwhile, SRK, Aaryan Khan, and AbRam Khan have dubbed the Hindi version of ‘Mufasa’ releasing on December 20.