Calcutta High Court to hear plea on Narada arrests today

The four leaders were taken to the Presidency Correctional Home in the city in the early hours of Tuesday

Security personnel outside CBI office, Nizam Palace, in Kolkata, Monday, May 18, 2021.

The stay on the interim bail and the review petition will both be heard by the Calcutta High Court on Wednesday.

A city court where the four accused were produced virtually by the CBI had granted them interim bail on Monday. Hours later, however, the CBI approached a division bench of Calcutta High Court, which after hearing the matter issued a stay on the interim bail till Wednesday .

Senior counsel and Trinamool Congress MP Kalyan Banerjee, who represented the TMC leaders at the city court, said he wasn’t even informed about the proceedings at the Calcutta High Court in which the anticipatory bail was stayed.

The four leaders were taken to the Presidency Correctional Home in the city in the early hours of Tuesday. Later in the day, Mr. Mukherjee, Mr. Mitra and Mr. Chatterjee

were admitted to the Woodburn Ward of State-run SSKM Hospital .

The Narada sting videos came to light in 2016, showing about a dozen Trinamool Congress leaders were purportedly seen accepting cash on camera. Two of the leaders seen in the videos — Suvendu Adhikari and Mukul Roy — who have since joined the BJP did not figure in the CBI’s chargesheet filed on Monday.

Also read: Who are the four arrested in Narada sting video case?

In its order staying the interim bail, the Calcutta High Court had pointed out that “This court has been called upon to deal with an extraordinary situation where the Chief Minister of the State can sit on a dharna outside the office of the Central Bureau of Investigation along with her supporters, which had investigated the case and was to present a chargesheet in court against the accused who are senior party leaders of the party in power in the State, some of them being Ministers.”

However, sections of the TMC leadership, including family members of those arrested said there was no dharna at the CBI office by the Chief Minister.

Priyadarshini Hakim, the daughter of Minister Firhad Hakim while referring to the court order, said there was no dharna outside the CBI office on Monday. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had arrived at Nizam Palace on Monday, but she went to the CBI office at 15th floor and was there for about six hours. The Chief Minister neither said anything to the media persons nor on social media about the Narada arrests, she pointed out.