In a pre-dawn raid on Saturday, a team of West Midnapore Police searched the residence of Trinamool Congress (TMC) national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee in Kolkata’s Kalighat area in connection with a land scam case in which his personal aide Sumit Roy was accused.
A senior West Midnapore police official said, “A team from Salboni police station searched Abhishek Banerjee’s house early on Saturday morning. The police went there in search of an accused. The search lasted a little over an hour. The accused was not found. No items were seized.”
Former Prime Minister Mamata Banerjee rushed to Abhishek’s residence soon after being alerted, people familiar with the matter said.
“They broke the locks to search the house. I am not the investigating agency. The agency conducted the search. So, they interrogated them. Not me,” Abhishek said.
This comes at a time when he has been summoned in three different cases by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the state police Criminal Investigation Department (CID). The Tripura court also issued a summons to him to appear before the Tripura Police on June 22.
“The Salboni team reached Kolkata late on Friday night while searching for Roy. His mobile tower location was traced. In the early hours of Saturday, the mobile tower location revealed that he was in Kalighat. A police team reached the spot,” an officer at Salboni police station said.
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The Salboni police team contacted their counterparts at Kalighat police station and a large contingent of police, including women police personnel, and Central Armed Police Force (CAPF) personnel reached his house at 121 Kalighat Road around 2 am.
“We asked those in the building to open the door or inform Abhishek Banerjee. But they did not do so. After a standoff that lasted about four hours, personnel from the Disaster Management Group of Kolkata Police were called in to break the locks,” the officer added.
The police team entered Abhishek’s house around 6 am, while a large contingent of the CAPF police force was stationed outside.
“Mamata Banerjee arrived soon after. A lawyer also arrived after her. The search began around 6.30 am and continued till 7.40 am. Both Mamata and Abhishek were present at that time. Mamata wanted to know what the case was and what the search process was,” the officer said.
The CID on Thursday questioned Abhishek for about six hours in connection with the signature forgery case. On Friday, a team from the Criminal Investigation Department arrived at his home to hand him a summons in a case related to making inflammatory speeches before the elections.
“Political vendetta is going from bad to worse,” the TMC wrote on X’s website.
These developments come at a time when the TMC led by Mamata Banerjee is facing unrest after defeat in the elections by a large section of the rebel TMC recognized as the “opposition” in the assembly, and the dispute has also reached its parliamentary party.
While three MPs resigned from the Rajya Sabha, around 19 MPs decided to approach the Lok Sabha Speaker, claiming that they are the “real TMC”. They also decided to look for a separate seating arrangement.
“So at 3am Kolkata Police arrived at @abhishekaitc’s house, opened the door and searched for 90 minutes to find nothing. Nothing was seized, 100% revenge. BJP tried everything. TMC MP Mahua Moitra wrote on X.
“Mata and Abhishek are gone now. These people gave them a befitting reply in the elections. They now have to face the Constitution for what they did. They cannot escape,” said Locket Chatterjee, a former BJP MP.
