ED and West Bengal counsels engage in heated exchange over I-PAC raids

New Delhi: A brief but a heated exchange of arguments was witnessed on Tuesday between ED and West Bengal government counsels in the Supreme Court during the resumed hearing of a plea filed by the probe agency against the West Bengal government and its chief minister, accusing them of obstructing the agency's recent searches at the premises of political consultancy firm I-PAC and the residence of its co-founder Pratik Jain.

While senior advocate Sidharth Luthra, appearing for West Bengal, said ED was being weaponised, additional solicitor general SV Raju, representing ED, counter alleged that the agency was being terrorised (by the state officials).

Appearing on behalf of the central government, solicitor general Tushar Mehta said the case involves an important principle regarding Article 32 of the Constitution. He was referring to the state government's claim that ED's plea, filed under Article 32, is not maintainable. The state has opposed the maintainability of the plea on the ground that Article 32 is a remedy available to citizens against the government's actions and the same cannot be invoked by a government agency like ED.


A bench of justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and KV Viswanathan adjourned the matter to March 18 for further consideration. At the last hearing, SC had issued notice to West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee, former acting DGP Rajeev Kumar and others on ED's plea.

SC had also asked Banerjee, Kumar and others to respond to ED's prayer for a CBI probe against them. The top court had expressed its strong displeasure over the disruption of court proceedings in the Calcutta High Court last month. The bench had said it was "very disturbed" at what transpired in the high court. The bench had also stayed FIRs registered by the state Police against ED officers.