Mumbai: The hearing on a plea by businessman Raj Kundra, arrested in the adult films case, alleging that his arrest was illegal as he was not served legal notices as per law was on Saturday, adjourned by the Bombay High Court
Kundra, along with associate Ryan Thorpe, has also sought interim bail pending the hearing of his petition seeking quashing of the case.
Submitting that 51 pornographic movies were seized from the accused persons, and material from personal laptops, mobile phones and storage devices were also recovered, Mumbai Police said the accused were arrested as they had started to destroy the evidence and the police couldn’t remain mute spectators to the same.
“Instead of co-operating, they started deleting content from the WhatsApp groups and chats. Thus, they started destroying evidence. When an accused starts destroying evidence the investigating authorities cannot be mute spectators, they have to prevent them. Therefore in order to prevent them, they were arrested,” Public Prosecutor Aruna Pai for Mumbai Police was quoted as saying by The Indian Express, arguing that the arrest was as per law. She added that thereafter Section 201 (punishment for causing disappearance of evidence) under IPC was also added against the accused.
Representing Kundra, senior advocate Aabad Ponda had earlier maintained that due procedure was not followed in the arrest and in case the notice was not acknowledged by Kundra, as per criminal procedure the investigating officer was required to avail an order from the magistrate to arrest him, but that was not done either.
Advocate Abhinav Chandrachud, appearing for Thorpe, had said that while his client had complied with the police notice, his arrest was illegal and sought relief from the court, the report added.
As the arguments could not continue further due to technical reasons, the bench posted it for a physical hearing on August 2.
