Calcutta HC hands over Sandeshkhali probe to CBI

Kolkata: Dealing yet another major blow to the Trinamul Congress government in West Bengal over the Sandeshkhali violence, the Calcutta high court on Tuesday ordered the CBI to probe the mob attack on an ED team during its raid at the house of TMC strongman Shahjahan Sheikh in the ration scam on January 5.

While passing the order, a division bench, comprising Chief Justice T.S. Sivagnanam and Justice Hiranmay Bhattacharya, also directed the state police to hand over Shahjahan to the CBI by 4.30 pm on Tuesday. The Mamata Banerjee government, however, moved the Supreme Court against the high court order immediately.

It sought an urgent hearing into the matter but suffered loss of face there too. Meanwhile, a CBI team visited the CID headquarters at Bhawani Bhavan in south Kolkata to take Shahjahan, who is the prime accused of orchestrating the mob attack, into custody and get the case documents from the state CID.

The expelled TMC leader was lodged at Bhawani Bhawan under a 10-day police remand after the CID took over the case against him following his arrest from Minakhan in North 24 Parganas on February 29. The CBI team later returned empty-handed as the state police did not hand over custody of the accused.

Earlier in the day, the division bench set aside the previous order constituting a special investigation team with the state police personnel and instructed the state police to hand over Shahjahan and the documents of three cases, filed at the Nyajat police station about the attack.

The bench observed: “It was made explicitly clear that the West Bengal state police are restrained from proceeding with the investigation in the cases which have been registered by them. Despite such an order, the one case stood transferred to the CID, West Bengal, who has issued notices dated 01.03.2024 under Section 91 and Section 160 CrPC.”

It added: “Thus, this act of the state police would be sufficient to hold that the state police are totally biased and every attempt is being made to delay the investigation in order to protect the accused who has been absconding for more than 50 days.”

Later the state government’s counsel, Abhishek “Manu” Singhvi, orally appealed to Justice Sanjiv Khanna of the Supreme Court for an urgent intervention against the HC order. The judge, however, directed the papers to be placed before Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud for further instructions.