Mumbai: Lookout Circulars (LOCs) issued by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against actress Rhea Chakraborty, her brother Showik and their father Indrajit were cancelled on Thursday.
“The LOCs are quashed and set aside. We have dismissed your (CBI) arguments on maintainability and we have said that it is needless to say that the authority to invoke the LOC whenever the circumstances arise,” Bombay High Court stated in its order.
The LOCs were issued by the central probe agency after an FIR was registered in actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s suicide case in 2020.
LOC is a notice issued to the Indian Bureau of Immigration to stop individuals facing prosecution from leaving the country or to detain them.
Rhea, who was prevented from travelling abroad despite work commitments, approached the court seeking quashing of the LOC. The High Court suspended the circular in December 2023 and permitted Rhea and Showik to travel abroad as an interim relief.
The CBI had asked the high court to pause the order for four weeks to allow them approach the Supreme Court. The high court refused to permit it.
The bench of Justices Revati Mohite Dere and Manjusha Deshpande observed that CBI’s apprehension of Rhea, Showik and their dad fleeing the country was not mentioned as reason for issuing the LOC.
Rhea was in a relationship with Sushant, and after his death, the actor’s family pointed fingers at the former. The case was thereafter transferred to the CBI in Delhi.
