West Bengal: Arrests, Dharna, Bail and Stay Order
By A Special Correspondent
First publised on 2021-05-18 03:22:18
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The CBI today arrested two senior TMC leaders and ministers in the state cabinet, Subrata Mukherjee and Firhad Hakim, along with TMC MLA Madan Mitra and former Kolkata mayor Sovan Chatterjee in the Narada tapes case. This led to a huge uproar and chief minister Mamata Banerjee camped outside the CBI main office in Kolkata. She said that these leaders were arrested without due process and challenged the CBI to arrest her too. The area was swamped by party supporters, some of whom turned unruly and threw stones at the Central forces who tried to remove them with batons.
Normally, MLAs are arrested after obtaining permission from the assembly Speaker. But in this case, the CBI obtained the permission from state governor Jagdeep Dhankhar. Dhankhar later said that he gave permission as he had sworn in Mukherjee and Hakim as ministers using his discretion under Articles 163 and 164 of the constitution. Mamata Banerjee said this was a clear contravention of norms and due process. She said that the CBI should have taken permission from the Speaker of the state assembly. Her nephew and party leader Abhishek Banerjee asked all to maintain calm and said that the party had full faith in the judiciary and will fight the battle legally.
Later in the day, the Special CBI court granted bail to the arrested accused saying that mere asking for judicial custody cannot be granted as there is no prayer for custody for further interrogation. But the CBI approached the Calcutta HC which stayed the order and posted the case for hearing on Wednesday. The CBI then made arrangements to take the accused to the presidency jail.
Questions are being raised in the manner of arrests as also the fact that others like Mukul Roy and Suvendhu Adhikari, who were also named in the Narada tapes but left the TMC to join the BJP, were not arrested. To be fair to the CBI, it has applied for sanction to move against Roy and Adhikari to Lok Speaker but it has not been granted yet. In any case, law must move fairly against all accused and being selective in prosecuting some is likely to boomerang on the CBI. This matter is now to be decided by the courts whether the governor was right in granting permission for prosecution or whether the CBI should have taken the Speakerâs nod.
