Popular YouTuber Elvish Yadav has been sent to 14-day judicial custody after he was arrested by the Noida police on Sunday, in the ongoing snake venom case. The social media personality, who had won Salman Khan-hosted reality show Bigg Boss OTT 2 in August 2023, was called by the police for a fresh round of questioning following which he was arrested.

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It was in November last year when an FIR was filed in Noida against Elvish and five others namely Rahul, Titunath, Jayakaran, Narayan and Ravinat, for allegedly supplying snake venom to rave parties. The case was lodged under provisions of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 and for criminal conspiracy under section 120B of the Indian Penal Code.

The FIR was filed after Noida Police had arrested those five people from a banquet hall in Sector 51 on November 3 and rescued nine snakes, including five cobras, from their possession. 20 ml of suspected snake venom was also seized during the raid. On November 4, Yadav was briefly stopped for questioning by police in Rajasthan’s Kota while he was travelling with his friends in a car but was let off soon. The YouTuber had claimed that he is innocent, adding that the case was a conspiracy against him.

The raid in November was conducted after People for Animals, an animal welfare organisation founded by the Sultanpur MP Maneka Gandhi, had complained to Noida police that Elvish organises rave parties in farmhouses of Delhi-NCR where he allegedly shoots videos with live snakes and uses snake venom as an intoxicant.

In a separate incident, Yadav was also embroiled in a controversy earlier this month after he was seen beating up another YouTuber, Maxtern aka Sagar Thakur, following which an FIR was lodged against him. Subsequently, Yadav issued a clarification and apologised for the incident.

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