Blow to Mamata Banerjee, moral victory for CBI: BJP on SC order in chit fund case

The BJP on Tuesday projected the apex court order directing Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar to make himself available before the CBI as a blow to the Mamata Banerjee-led government in West Bengal and a moral victory for the investigating agency.

The Supreme Court said Kumar would appear before the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the Meghalaya capital Shillong. The court also said no coercive steps, including the arrest of the Kolkata Police chief, will take place during the course of the investigation.

Senior BJP leader and Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad welcomed the order and said it's a blow to the Mamata Banerjee government and a victory for the CBI. It also showed that nobody is above the law, including the police commissioner, he added.

The Kolkata Police commissioner will appear before the CBI in Shillong as the environment is not conducive in West Bengal, Prasad said.

Describing the order as a "slap on the face" of the Mamata Banerjee-led government, top functionaries in the central government said it is quite apparent that the court has taken a dim view of the Kolkata Police commissioner and the entire top bureaucracy of the Mamata government.

Emphasising that the conduct of the Mamata government's senior officers is being watched, the functionaries, citing the order, said the apex court has asked the Kolkata Police chief "to faithfully cooperate with the investigating agency at all times".

The Mamata Banerjee-led government in the state and the BJP are at loggerheads after the CBI tried to question Kolkata's Police commissioner in connection with chit fund scams. Banerjee has been on a 'dharna' since Sunday night over the CBI's attempts to interrogate the police chief.