Did Not Go To I-PAC Premises as CM But as Chairman of TMC: Mamata Banerjee to SC
New Delhi: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee told the Supreme Court on Thursday that she went to the I-PAC premises on January 8 after receiving information that some unauthorized persons had entered the office of Pratik Jain, who was entrusted with TMC’s election affairs.
Clarifying that Banerjee did not go to the Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) premises as the chief minister, senior advocate Kapil Sibal told a bench comprising Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and Vipul Pancholi on her behalf that the Trinamool Congress (TMC) president went there as the party president.
“I-PAC is interested in elections in West Bengal. A formal agreement has been signed by the party with I-PAC in 2021.
“We assume ED (Enforcement Directorate) knows about this. There is a set of data stored in IPAC,” Sibal said.
He went on to say that they knew a lot of the party’s data would be there when the emergency services got there.
“What was the need to go there in the middle of the election? The last statement in the coal fraud was recorded on February 24, 2024.
“What have they been doing since then? Why are they so eager in the middle of the election? How will we fight the election if you get the information?” he said.
He said the TMC president has the right to go.
“Why should ED go to the part of the party office where all the information is?” Sibal surrendered.
Questioning the sustainability of ED’s plea, Sibal said that this issue should be heard by the Calcutta High Court. He said that precisely when it was election time, ED intervened in the name of investigation.
“The high court can hear this under Article 226. This is the hierarchy. They are filing parallel cases,” Sibal said.
He denied ED’s allegation of interference and obstruction by Banerjee and said: “CM’s claim that he took all the devices is false. It is proven by his own panchnamas (call records). This is just creating bias.”
Senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, speaking on behalf of the state government and police officials, stated that the chief minister was under Z+ protection and hence it was DGP Rajeev Kumar’s duty to accompany him when he entered the I-PAC premises.
The apex court termed the ED’s allegation of “obstruction” in Banerjee’s investigation as “very serious” and agreed to examine whether a state’s law enforcement agencies can interfere with any central agency’s investigation into any serious crime.
It stayed an FIR filed in West Bengal against ED officials who raided the I-PAC office and the house of its director Pratik Jain on January 8 and directed the state police to preserve CCTV footage of the raids.
ED’s plea in the apex court comes in the wake of events on January 8, when ED officials faced hurdles during the probe agency’s raids on the office of political consultancy firm I-PAC in Salt Lake and the residence of its chief Pratik Jain in Kolkata in connection with a coal smuggling case.
The investigating agency claimed that Banerjee entered the building and took away “key” evidence related to the investigation.
While the chief minister accused the central agency of going overboard, his party, TMC, rejected the claim that the ED was “obstructing” the investigation. The state’s police registered an FIR against the ED officers.
