Arbaaz Gets Anxiety Attacks, Unable to Sleep, Reveals Father; Says Aryan Has Hope as He is SRK’s Son

Arbaaz Merchant, one of the accused in the Mumbai drugs-on-cruise case, is going through episodes of anxiety attacks and unable to sleep at all since he was assigned a barrack in the Arthur Road jail, revealed his father, Aslam on Saturday.

The family is currently facing an extreme emotional upheaval since the young man got embroiled in the drug bust case in early October.

Aslam, a lawyer by profession, said that he has been meeting his son at all the hearings, however, his wife met him after almost 20 days, and broke down outside the cell. “It was a very emotional moment for us and she cried inconsolably. But, look at the irony, I had to stop her and tell her to not waste the precious little time we got with Arbaaz in crying. We were there to talk,” Aslam told ETimes in an exclusive interview.

ALSO READ | ‘Disappointed’: Father of Arbaaz Merchant, Aryan Khan’s Friend, Sent to Judicial Custody in Drug Bust Case

The 26-year-old told his father that he is sharing the general barrack with six-seven inmates and has no knowledge of their background. Aslam said, “The moment he saw us Arbaaz said, ‘Look where I have landed?’ Arbaaz told me he is getting anxiety attacks and cannot sleep at all,” Aslam said.

Aslam, a tensed father, believes that the anxiety of his son could be from separation from his friend Aryan, who is lodged in a different cell, leaving him alone. Further, he rued that unlike Aryan Khan, Arbaaz “does not have an influential father like Shah Rukh Khan.”

“It hurt me to see my son on the other side of the jail fence, a place where I normally see my clients, other inmates, before representing them in court. Personally, I feel, at least Aryan has hope that his father is Shah Rukh Khan, a hugely popular and influential figure. But neither Arbaaz nor his father has that kind of influence. We’re just common people with no connections. I think Arbaaz was unlucky, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was just destiny I guess,” he said.

But he said that he is happy that at least his son stuck by his best friend Aryan like a loyal friend, calling him a “yaaron ka yaar.”

“They have separated the two friends — Aryan has been kept in a separate cell, while Arbaaz is in another one. He is getting food like any other prisoner. Whenever he’s met me briefly before the court hearings, the first thing he’s wanted to know is about the development in the case,” he told the leading daily.

Aryan, Munmun Dhamecha and Arbaaz were arrested by the NCB on October 3 following a raid on a Goa-bound ship, while the other five were arrested the next day. They were produced before Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate R M Nerlikar at the end of their earlier remand. The court sent them in judicial custody even as the probe agency had sought extension of remand till October 11.

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