Mamata Banerjee holding protest to ‘save herself’ from CBI, says Prakash Javadekar; claims breakdown of order in West Bengal

Kolkata: The situation in West Bengal is an Emergency imposed by Mamata Banerjee, not by us, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said on Monday. “This is Mamata’s Emergency in Bengal. This is not ours, it’s Mamata,” said Union human resource development minister Prakash Javadekar at a press conference.

Javadekar’s remark comes a day after Mamata sat on ‘dharna’ over the tussle between the state police and CBI. Terming the incident as “one of a kind”, Javadekar said that never before a CBI investigating team was taken into custody by the state police and called the move as a “murder of democracy.”

“Whatever is happening in Kolkata and in West Bengal is one of a kind. Never before was an investigating team taken into custody by the police. It is a murder of democracy. We want to ask Mamata Banerjee — why is she staging a dharna? Who does she want to shield? Police Commissioner (Rajeev Kumar) or herself?”

Key leaders from a number of Opposition parties, including TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu, AAP chief and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, NC leaders Farooq and Omar Abdullah, among others, extended support to Mamata.

Commenting on this, Javadekar said: “Opposition parties have supported Mamata. Who are these people? They are out on bail. Such people are standing together. This is not Mahagathbandhan. It is divided by vision and united by corruption. The corrupt are standing together.”

Echoing similar views, Union minister Smriti Irani said: “The fact that paramilitary forces had to be deployed for the protection of those officers who were diligently doing their duty is for the first time an unprecedented view given to citizens with regards to the state of anarchy in West Bengal.”

A five-member CBI team moved to arrest Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar on Sunday, but were denied entry to the Kolkata Police chief’s residence and subsequently detained. Following the incident, Banerjee started a sit-in protest along with her ministers on Sunday night.

Kumar, a 1989-batch IPS officer of West Bengal cadre was heading a SIT on the Saradha and Rose Valley scams. The CBI wanted the top officer to hand over the seizure list made during his probe, sources said. Reportedly, the top cop was to be questioned regarding missing documents and files but was not responding to notices to appear before the agency.