Cash-for-school job: Kuntal Ghosh challenges Calcutta HC’s order staying joint probe by central, state agencies

Kolkata, Sep 28 (IANS) Expelled Trinamool Congress leader and prime accused in the cash-for-school job case in West Bengal Kuntal Ghosh approached the Calcutta High Court challenging stay on a joint probe by central and state agencies for probe into his letters.

In the letters, Ghosh accused central agencies of pressuring him to name Trinamool Congress’s national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee in the school job case.

A single-judge bench of Justice Amrita Sinha of the same court had stayed a joint probe by central and state agencies in the matter.

The order for joint probe by Central Bureau of India (CBI) and Kolkata Police in the matter was originally given by a special court of CBI in Kolkata.

However, on September 14 Justice Sinha’s bench stayed the order on grounds that since the matter was being investigated by central agencies following an order from the Calcutta High Court, a lower court cannot intervene in the order by ordering a joint probe by CBI and Kolkata Police in the same matter.

The judge of the special CBI court has also been transferred.

However, on Thursday, Ghosh approached Calcutta high- court’s single- judge bench of Justice Soumen Sen against the stay on joint investigation.

In his petition Ghosh has argued that the joint probe was stayed by Justice Sinha’s bench without hearing his part of the argument in the matter.

On Wednesday, Justice Abhiit Gangopadhyay also questioned the order for joint probe by the special court and also directed that the transfer process of the judge concerned should be completed by October.

Following his summon, the state law minister Malay Ghatak personally appeared at Justice Gangopadhyay’s bench and assured the clearance of the file relating to the transfer at the earliest. The same day, Justice Gangopadhyay also observed that the state police agencies have no business to intervene in an investigation by the central agency, which is being conducted following a high court order.

“The members of the SIT of CBI should not be touched at all. There should be no compromise on the issue of corruption,” Justice Gangopadhyay observed.

–IANS

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