April 12, 2019
NEW DELHI: Something “very very serious” seems to be going on in West Bengal, the Supreme Court said Friday as it agreed to hear a plea alleging harassment of customs officials at Kolkata Airport for checking the luggage of a TMC leader’s wife. The top court asked the West Bengal government to file its reply on the plea within four weeks. A bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justice Sanjiv Khanna said: “Someone has drawn our attention to something very very serious. We don’t know yet whose claim is bona fide but we would like to go into the root of the matter.
“Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the customs department and assisted by advocate Ravi Prakash, told the bench that the plea pertains to the incident of March 15-16 when customs officials were obstructed from carrying out their duty. The obstruction was caused to the officials, when two women including one Rujira Naroola Banerjee, wife of Abhishek Banerjee who is TMC MP and nephew of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, was intercepted at the airport for checking.
Senior advocate Abhishek M Singhvi objected to the issuance of notice and said that the petition is not maintainable as the petitioner Rajkumar Barthwal is a member of Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs and has no locus standi to file the plea.
To this, the bench observed that it does not know the bona fide of the petitioner but “We cannot ignore what is going on in West Bengal. If required we can ourselves take suo motu cognizance of the events and get to the bottom of the issue”.
Sources : The Hansindia
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