Kolkata: After the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), it is now another central agency, the Enforcement Directorate (ED), that has reportedly summoned Trinamul Congress MLA Iqbal Ahmed for questioning in connection with the Narada sting operation. Several other top Trinamul leaders were allegedly caught accepting bribe in cash promising favours in return.
It has asked Mr Ahmed to appear at its office in CGO Complex in Salt Lake on June 21, according to sources. Mr Ahmed’s lawyer Danish Haque however claimed that no summons from the ED had reached the Trinamul MLA so far.
Sources indicated that the finance ministry’s agency wanted to know how Mr Ahmed came to know Narada CEO Mathew Samuel, who had approached him first after coming to the city for the sting operation ahead of the Lok Sabha elections in 2014. Mr Ahmed, who is also the Kolkata deputy mayor, earlier skipped his appearance before the anti corruption branch of the CBI following summons, citing illness.
He had sought a week’s time before his appearance. The ED earlier also initiated a case under charges of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act against the dozen Trinamul leaders including ministers, parliamentarians and MLAs and IPS officer S.M.H Meerza based on the CBI’s case under the Prevention of Corruption Act.
The sting tapes were put on the Narada News website and shown by the BJP at a press conference in Kolkata on 14 March 2016, just ahead of last year's assembly elections. The CM called it a conspiracy.
