Trinamool Congress asks Supreme Court to monitor inquiry Saradha scam

NEW DELHI: The Trinamool Congress asked the Supreme Court on Monday to monitor the Central Bureau of Investigation’s inquiry into the Saradha scam, saying it was being used to harass the West Bengal ruling party and its leaders by the Centre as part of a “political agenda”. It also sought a ban on information related to the case being released to the media as this was maligning the party’s image ahead of civic elections.

The top court had directed CBI in May 9 last year to probe the multi-crore scam that has drawn in members of West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s government. SC had transferred all cases registered in West Bengal and Odisha to CBI under its order. The Trinamool application was filed by party general secretary Mahua Moitra. In a separate plea, the state government also demanded similar relief.

The state’s application urged that the court monitor the CBI probe to ensure it was fair and professional. Both these pleas were mentioned on an urgent out-of-turn basis by senior advocate Kapil Sibal before a two- judge bench comprising justices TS Thakur and Adarsh Kumar Goel. Sibal urged the court to monitor the probe in the interests of justice to prevent “leaks”, which were damaging the image of the state. The court indicated that it may hear his plea on Thursday. Moitra named several BJP officials, including president Amit Shah in her plea.

“Ex-facie, the members of BJP and the central government have much prior information as to what steps will be taken by CBI,” she said.

The petition suggested BJP seemed to be aware of CBI’s steps such as the arrest of transport minister Madan Mitra and the questioning of Mukul Roy before it happened. The agency cannot take directions from “political masters”, it said, adding details related to Roy’s questioning were leaked, resulting in a “media trial prejudicial to justice”. It added: “Such statements about where the investigation in the scam is heading shows the deeper sinister objective of the ruling party at the Centre to affect the electoral outcome in the state.”