Narada: CBI arrests two Bengal ministers, an MLA, and a former mayor : HC stays bail order, hearing tomorrow
Crackdown comes days after the BJP’s crushing Assembly poll defeat and just when the state government is battling a Covid emergency
Shortly after the morning arrests of cabinet ministers Firhad Hakim and Subrata Mukherjee, MLA Madan Mitra and former mayor Sovan Chatterjee, chief minister Mamata Banerjee arrived outside the CBI office, offered to be arrested and stayed put till the accused were granted interim bail by a CBI court in the evening.
However, the CBI moved Calcutta High Court, following which a bench headed by acting Chief Justice Rajesh Bindal stayed the bail order on Monday night. The high court will hear the plea to cancel the bail on Wednesday.
The four accused “shall be treated to be in judicial custody till further orders”, the high court bench said.
The petitioner informed the high court bench that “the chief minister came to the spot (the CBI office)… and sat on dharna there. The matter did not end there. The law minister of the state went to the (CBI) court, where the accused were to be presented, along with a crowd of 2,000 to 3,000 supporters and remained in court throughout the day.”
In the order, the high court bench said: “We are not touching the merits of the controversy but the manner in which pressure was sought to be put will not inspire confidence of the people in the rule of law.”
The CBI requested the court to transfer the case to another state. The court did not immediately pronounce its decision.
Before the high court bench of Justices Bindal and Arijit Banerjee, the CBI was represented by solicitor-general of India Tushar Mehta and additional solicitor-general of India Y.J. Dastoor.
All four politicians had been picked up from their homes one by one between 8am and 9am by teams of three or four CBI officials and about two dozen central force personnel each, following sanction from governor Jagdeep Dhankhar. The accused cooperated and did not resist arrest, sources said.
The quartet were brought to the CBI office at Nizam Palace around 10.30am. Mamata arrived about 15 minutes later and headed to the 14th floor to meet the DIG CBI, the senior-most agency officer in the building, and offered to be arrested.
She spent the next six hours there, leaving only around 5pm after learning that the CBI court had granted bail to all four after a virtual hearing.
Sources close to the chief minister said she had not entered the DIG’s room but waited outside. She then agreed to a request to use a vacant cabin, meant for an SP. She was offered tea, biscuits and sorbet but refused each time, sources said.
“It was a very courteous exchange of words between Madam and the CBI officers. Her point was that it was illegal to arrest ministers and legislators without seeking the Assembly Speaker’s permission. The officers kept citing an amendment to the laws to justify their act,” a CBI officer told this newspaper.
The biggest casualty of the arrests could be the planning and preparations for the battle against Covid since Hakim is the man in charge of the civic body.
Mamata, who spent the day at the CBI office, had to deal with two fronts. The chief minister made several phone calls and received a few, including one from Dhankhar sometime after the governor had tweeted his concern for law and order in the state.
Dhankhar’s tweet read: “Concerned at alarming situation. Call upon @Mamataofficial to follow constitutional norms & rule of law. Police @WBPolice @KolkataPolice @HomeBengal must take all steps to maintain law & order… Sad- situation is being allowed to drift with no tangible action by authorities.”
Concerned at alarming situation. Call upon @MamataOfficial to follow constitutional norms & rule of law.Sad- situation is being allowed to drift with no tangible action by authorities.— Governor West Bengal Jagdeep Dhankhar (@jdhankhar1) May 17, 2021
Mamata is said to have expressed displeasure at Dhankhar’s comments on law and order and assured him that everything was under control.
“It was not a very pleasant conversation. She was upset with him and told him she knew who was behind all this (the arrests). She asked him not to indulge in such things in future,” a source said.
While Mamata was at Nizam Palace, the area outside on AJC Bose Road turned into a virtual battlefield.
Groups of Trinamul supporters protesting the arrests closed in on the building, some trying to break through the police cordon. The central forces carried out a baton charge before the city police took control and pushed the crowd back.
Trinamul supporters protested at many other places across the state. Party leaders questioned the legality of the arrests.
While stepping out of his Chetla home with CBI officers by his side around 8.55am, Hakim had said: “The CBI is arresting me without seeking permission from the Speaker.”
Trinamul spokesperson Kunal Ghosh later complained: “How come they arrived with so many men, who huddled in the neighbourhood without maintaining social distancing? Where was the need to bring (so many of) them? What did the CBI think, that Dada (one of the accused four) would try to run? The CBI should be ashamed of playing puppet to the BJP.”
The non-BJP Opposition parties in the state condemned the CBI action and attributed political motives to the sudden arrests.
The CBI has for the past four years been probing the five-year-old, purported Narada sting operation that showed people resembling eminent figures accepting wads of cash. The FIR names 13 people, mostly Trinamul politicians some of whom later defected to the BJP. Sovan recently left the BJP too.
The agency submitted its first chargesheet in the case on Monday, charging the four arrested politicians and a former IPS officer, S.M.H. Mirza, under sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act and the Indian Penal Code. Mirza had been arrested earlier and is out on bail.
All the four accused were produced before the CBI court through webcam, and lawyers from both sides presented their arguments.
Trinamul MP Kalyan Banerjee, who represented the three arrested party leaders, alleged “CBI vindictiveness”.
“The Supreme Court had recently passed an order that police should not unnecessarily arrest anyone due to the pandemic situation. When my clients had cooperated all through, what was the need for all this?” he said.
Kalyan argued that the governor cannot “give independent sanction (for such arrests) without the aid and advice of the council of ministers headed by the chief minister”.
The CBI’s lawyers argued that the accused, being “influential”, could tamper with evidence and should therefore be remanded in judicial custody.
Judge Anupam Mukherjee granted the four accused interim bail against a bond of Rs 50,000 each with two sureties of Rs 25,000 each on the condition that they would cooperate with the investigating officer.
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