Kolkata: The Indian National Congress (INC) leaders seem to be divided over their reactions to the Enforcement Directorate (ED)’s simultaneous raid and search operations at the office of the India Political Action Committee (I-PAC) and at the residence of I-PAC co-founder Pratik Jain at Loudon Street in Kolkata.
The differences of opinion in the matter are especially evident in the divergent reactions to the matter by a national-level leader of the state and a state-level leader in West Bengal.
Senior Congress leader and senior Supreme Court advocate, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, issued a statement lambasting the ED for its raids on the I-PAC office and the residence of its co-founder.
“ED now raids political consultants because it has failed to raid facts, truth or credibility. The I-PAC raid in Kolkata is yet another chapter in the BJP’s playbook of coercion. When democracy is inconvenient, agencies are weaponised,” Singhvi said in his statement.
Incidentally, Singvi had represented the Mamata government in several high-profile cases both at the Supreme Court and the Calcutta High Court.
However, a completely divergent view was expressed by the former state Congress president in West Bengal and the former five-time Congress Lok Sabha member, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, who questioned Mamata Banerjee’s anxiety regarding the ED’s actions against I-PAC.
“Why is the Chief Minister having headaches about I-PAC? Surely there is a mystery behind it,” Chowdhury said in his reaction about the ED’s actions and the counter-reactions by the Chief Minister on the matter.
Incidentally, the Leader of the Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, also raised the same question on Thursday, after the Chief Minister stormed into the residence of Jain and the I-PAC office, accompanied by senior administrative and police officers, while the ED raids were going on. She reportedly left the place with some files and electronic documents.
“Why is the Chief Minister so worried about the ED raid at the office of a private corporate entity?” Adhikari raised the question on Thursday.
I-PAC has been serving as the vote-strategy agency for the Trinamool Congress since 2020.
(IANS)
