CBI conduct in Bengal a conspiracy, says senior SP leader

Samajwadi Party (SP) national Vice President Kiranmoy Nanda on Monday dubbed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI)'s attempt to question the Kolkata Police chief in connection with a ponzi scheme scam a 'conspiracy' hatched by the BJP ahead of the Lok Sabha polls.

"The Supreme Court order (asking the CBI to probe the ponzi schme scam) came in 2014. Now it is 2019. The elections are round the corner... This is a conspiracy," Nanda told reporters at the site of dharna (sit-in) being staged by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in a bid "to save the constitution and federal structure of the country".

He said the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is ridden with corruption.

"The biggest scamsters are in the BJP -- Amit Shah, Narendra Modi."

In an unprecedented confrontation between the Modi-led Central government and the West Bengal government, Banerjee began the sit-in at 9 p.m on Sunday night accusing Modi and BJP chief Shah of attempting a coup to destabilise her state, saying there is a "constitutional break-down", after an ugly face-off between the CBI and the state police.

The showdown started after the central probe agency's officers showed up near the residence of Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar, who has been under the scanner in connection with the CBI probe into the ponzi scheme scam case.

CM Banerjee continued her sit-in protest on Monday. The Trinamool Congress supremo, surrounded by her ministers and top party leaders, stayed up the entire night on a makeshift dais at the city hub Dharamtala area, near the Metro Channel.

--IANS

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