Abhishek Banerjee not to face ED questioning on Oct 3

Kolkata, Sep 29 (IANS) Trinamool Congress’ national general secretary and the party Lok Sabha member Abhishek Banerjee on Friday morning made it clear that he will not be going to the Enforcement Directorate (ED)’s Salt Lake office in northern outskirts of Kolkata on October 3 to face questioning on the multi-crore cash-for-school job case in West Bengal because of his preoccupation with a party programme at New Delhi on that day.

A clear message was conveyed by Banerjee himself through a message that he posted on his X handle on Friday morning. “The fight against the deprivation of WB and its rightful dues shall persist regardless of the obstacles. No force on Earth can hinder my dedication to fight for the people of WB and their fundamental rights. I'll b in Delhi joining the protest on Oct 2nd & 3rd. STOP ME IF U CAN!” his X message read.

Banerjee is supposed to be at the national capital for these days to lead Trinamool Congress’ protest demonstration at Jantar Mantar against the Union government’s "reluctance" to release funds to the West Bengal government. After he received the ED notice on Thursday, he said that ED is deliberately summoning on crucial days when he has prior political assignments.

In the fresh notice, ED has summoned him as the chief executive officer of a corporate entity whose name had surfaced in connection with the central agency probe in the school hob case.

While Banerjee has made it clear that he would not be present at ED’s Salt Lake office on October 3, it is not clear what be the possible action on this count by his parents, Lata Banerjee and Amit Banerjee, who had also been summoned by ED at the same office next week. Both have been summoned for questioning as directors of the same corporate entity whose name surfaced in the course of the probe.

To recall, on September 22, the Calcutta High Court’s single- judge bench of Justice Tirthankar Ghosh rejected Banerjee’s plea for dismissal of the Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) filed against him by ED in the case. However, the bench granted him an interim protection against any coercive action by the ED just on the basis of the ECIR. The Justice observed that since the preliminary findings in ECIR are just based on some statements of another accused in the case Sujay Krishna Bhadra, so on the basis of that ECIR no coercive action can be taken against him for the time being.

Again on September 24, the ED sleuths faced the ire of the Calcutta High Court’s single- judge bench of Justice Amrita Sinha for submitting incomplete details on the assets and properties of Banerjee.