“Why were Suvendu Adhikari & Mukul Roy not arrested in Narada case?”: Trinamool leaders ask
Three Trinamool leaders arrested by the CBI.
West Bengal ministers Firhad Hakim and Subrata Mukherjee along with former ministers Madan Mitra and Sovon Chatterjee were arrested on Monday by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). They were taken from their homes to the CBI office in Nizam Palace where they were asked to sign arrest memos, it is learnt.
West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar had earlier sanctioned CBI investigations against Firhad Hakim, Subrata Mukherjee, Madan Mitra and Sovon Chatterjee. The case involves a sting operation in which Trinamool Congress leaders were purportedly seen on camera taking bribes. The operation was carried out in 2014 and released ahead of the 2016 assembly elections in West Bengal.
Firhad Hakim, Subrata Mukherjee and Madan Mitra are Trinamool leaders who have been recently re-elected as MLAs while Sovon Chatterjee had joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from the Trinamool but has not contested the 2021 Assembly election.
Following the arrest of the three Trinamool Congress leaders, the party questioned the CBI move, asking how and why former Trinamool leaders Suvendu Adhikari and Mukul Roy were not named in the chargesheet. The videos that surfaced purportedly showed both and an IPS officer naming Roy as well. Adhikari and Roy are both BJP leaders, and the former is the Leader of Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly.
Trinamool Congress spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said that this was “an act of vengeance by the BJP-led government at the Centre for not being able to win the elections in the state and using their power and position to instruct the CBI to take such steps”. Ghosh asked why Adhikari and Roy had not been arrested when both were also being probed in the Narada case.
Trinamool MP Sougata Roy said that “After losing the election, CBI has taken this step under the Centre’s instruction”. He also questioned the Governor’s move of giving “clearance” without referring the matter to the government or the Speaker saying “all three are elected MLAs”.
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