Coal scam case: Abhishek Banerjee and his wife moved Delhi HC against ED

News Desk: TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee and his wife Rujira Banerjee moved Delhi High Court against the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in connection with the coal scam case and sought direction that they be not summoned to Delhi and any further examination of them be carried out only in Kolkata.

Petition of Abhishek Banerjee and Rujira Banerjee

“There exists no jurisdiction for the ED’s Delhi-based Head Investigative Unit to assume investigative powers in the case as the same could only have been investigated into by the concerned zonal office at Kolkata.

That a greater degree of protection is granted to a woman under Section 160 Cr.P.C., which mandates that a woman shall not be required to attend any place other than where she resides. That the repeated issuance of summons to the Petitioner No. 2 who is a lady, to appear before the Respondent is ex facie illegal and mala fide and hence intervention of this Hon’ble Court is sought before coercive measures are resorted to by the Respondent.

We have serious apprehensions about the fairness of the investigation being conducted by the ED. They are adopting a pick and choose attitude with respect to certain persons and is giving undue benefit and protection to complicit individuals and in return extracting false, baseless and malicious statements from them.

The ED is selectively leaking information to the media with the intent of harming our reputation”