No Supreme Court relief for Mamata-led TMC over frozen bank accounts - The Indian Express

The Supreme Court on Thursday turned down a plea by the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress faction challenging the West Bengal Police move to freeze four party bank accounts.

A two-judge bench, presided by Justice M M Sundresh, noted that the matter was still pending before the Calcutta High Court and requested it to expedite the hearing. The court added that it had not gone into the merits of the issue.

The bench, also comprising Justice P B Varale, was hearing the Mamata group’s plea against the Calcutta High Court’s August 27 order, which refused to grant the faction any interim relief on its plea against freezing of the Indian Bank accounts.

The court recorded Solicitor General Tushar Mehta’s submissions that the Election Commission of India (ECI) had frozen the election symbol of the party and hence, the question of which faction gets to operate the account could only be decided after that matter was settled.

Appearing for the petitioner, Senior Advocate A M Singhvi submitted that the freezing of the bank accounts is an attempt to stop the political activities of the party and had paralysed its activities. Referring to party’s audited accounts, he said that a minimum of Rs 12.15 crore was needed every month towards party expenses in view of the upcoming bypolls etc. “AITC is the third largest party in the country. Rs 12.5 crores is the minimum required monthly to run the party. Minimum for political activity,” he said.

The senior counsel contended that “West Bengal is a peculiar state where the official Opposition officially supports the ruling party. There is no opposition…The one Opposition which lost in the election is paralysed by the state police.”

Singhvi said the police had frozen the accounts without any judicial oversight involved in it.

Opposing the prayer, Mehta, appearing for the state government, said two factions were claiming to be the real Trinamool and the Supreme Court had asked the ECI to decide which is the real party. “The other group is also saying permit us to operate the account,” he said, adding it will therefore have to wait the decision on the real Trinamool.

On the freeze on the accounts, Mehta said, “There was a complaint and we came to know that the personal secretary of the general secretary of the then Trinamool Congress had deposited Rs 35 crore by way of cash into the account. He, Sumit Roy, filed for anticipatory bail but lost before high court and Supreme Court. These are the accounts which are frozen and we are investigating how he got the money.”

“When the earlier government was there, he used to convert government lands to private lands and sell them. There were statements recorded which to this effect and that money came to be deposited and it is being investigated,” Mehta added.

The senior law officer pointed out that the high court had fixed the matter for hearing after the Durga Puja holidays.