| |
|---|
News Desk: Trinamool Congress (TMC) MP Kalyan Banerjee on Thursday accused West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar of obstructing the probe against purported chartered accountant Govind Agarwal who was arrested by the Kolkata Police on November 21 in connection with a 2017 corruption case.
“A day after the arrest of Govind Agarwal, governor Dhankhar tweeted against the Kolkata Police. He alleged that the operation was politically motivated. I found that such a statement from the governor is an attempt to impede the probe. As per the rules in the Indian Constitution, I would like to request the Kolkata Police to initiative prosecution against him under section 186 and 189 of the IPC. The same case was also probed by the ED, which functions under the central government. Is he also trying to criticise the central agency? Or is he only trying to target the Kolkata police? I would like to appeal to our President to remove him from the post of governor of Bengal,” Banerjee said while addressing a press conference.
The TMC MP has also accused the governor of being connected with people who have criminal backgrounds.
Kalyan Banerjee is a TMC MP and he won the 2019 Lok Sabha Polls from the Serampore constituency in Hooghly district.
He called the press conference after Dhankhar on November 22 accused the Kolkata Police of conducting a “politically inspired operation” to arrest a “rumoured” chartered accountant to obstruct a team of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Income Tax Department investigating the coal and cow smuggling racket in West Bengal.
The governor tweeted, “Alarmingly worrisome inputs from CA fraternity-politically inspired operation over zealousy afoot@KolkataPolice headed #DD targets CAs-strategy-fishing for material to handicap team members that raided mafia #coal #cattle. Why forget ‘Be ye never so high, the law is above you’.”
“Beneficiaries in ‘uniform’ and power in pre-emptive mode to compromise team members #coal #cattle mafia raids to neutralize or impede actions against them. Those spearheading this extra legal antidotal operation are oblivious that these misadventures are often counterproductive. To vindicate my oath to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution and the law….and devote to the service and well-being of the people of the State, would take all steps so that public servants are politically neutral and governance @MamataOfficial is as per constitution,” his tweet reads further.
His posts came after a Kolkata Police team arrested Govind Agarwal on November 21. He was arrested in a corruption case in which a tax department official has also been named.
“He was used as a middleman by an I-T officer to park and invest black money. We got inputs that an IRS officer, then posted in the income tax department in Kolkata, had allegedly used Agarwal as a frontman to park illegal funds in various companies. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) was also keeping track of one similar company where illegal money was parked with the help of Agarwal,” a senior Kolkata Police officer said.
Dhankhar, however, hit back saying that he would continue to discharge his constitutional obligations as he cannot fiddle in Raj Bhavan when political violence is going on in the state.
“My assurance to the people of the state is that in the coming days there would be more such packing of vilification campaign so that there may be a diversion from the burning issues,” the Governor said in a statement issued by Raj Bhavan.
“I as Constitutional head cannot countenance public servants acting as political workers. This is too serious to be ignored. This would be dangerous to democracy,” the Governor was quoted in the Raj Bhavan statement.
