Journalism of Courage
The West Bengal Crime Investigation Department (CID) has alleged that the Delhi Police “restrained” its team from conducting raids in Delhi on Wednesday in an ongoing probe related to the recovery of nearly Rs 50 lakh in cash from three Jharkhand Congress MLAs.
A CID team of four officials, including one inspector, two sub-inspectors and one assistant of sub-inspector-rank police official, were to conduct a raid at the house of Sidharth Majumder in Anandaniketan in Delhi’s South Chanakyapuri when “they were restrained from carrying out their lawful duty”, the CID said. Majumder, a senior CID official said, is “directly connected” to the case.
“We were not allowed to conduct the raid. We had to come back without the search. We are still waiting,” police inspector Arijit Bhattacharjee, a member of the search team who is in Delhi, said.
The CID has claimed that Majumder is a “close confidant” of BJP and was allegedly in touch with Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma. The CID had alleged on Tuesday that the three Jharkhand MLAs were part of a conspiracy to topple their state government and were in touch with Sarma. The Indian Express has learnt that Majumder was earlier with the Congress.
“The chief judicial magistrate, Howrah, had issued a warrant to search the home of one Sidharth Majumder, who is directly connected to this case. We had authorised the investigating officer to conduct the search operation. The team had a search warrant ( a copy of which is with Express) with them but have been restrained from carrying out their lawful duty,” a senior CID official told The Indian Express.
CID officials now suspect that this action will lead to the disappearance of crucial evidence and said that the onus is on the Delhi police officers who prevented the search.
Earlier Wednesday morning, the CID had posted a tweet after their team was allegedly stopped from carrying out the raids in South Delhi. “In course of investigation of Panchla PS Case No 276/22 a team of CID which had gone to Delhi to execute search warrant issued by Ld Court has been stopped from doing their lawful duty on the direction of @dcp_southwest. Personal intervention of @CPDelhi is requested,” tweeted CID Bengal.
A political war of words has erupted with Trinamool Congress spokesperson Kunal Ghosh saying that he suspects “something is fishy” and called it an “unfortunate incident”.
State BJP spokesperson Shamik Bhattacharya said, “So many investigations are going on following court orders. If they are facing any legal hurdles, they can approach the court too.”
Jamtara MLA Irfan Ansari, Khijri MLA Rajesh Kachhap and Kolebira MLA Naman Bixel were arrested in West Bengal with nearly Rs 50 lakh on Sunday and were subsequently suspended by the Congress.
The CID had raided a trader’s office close to the police headquarters in Lalbazar on Tuesday in connection with this case and seized more than Rs 3.31 lakh, 250 silver coins and documents.
