Kolkata: West Bengal’s chief electoral officer Ariz Aftab has sent to the Election Commission the transcript of the controversial audio tape, which has a purported conversation between chief minister Mamata Banerjee and Trinamool Congress’ Sitalkuchi candidate Partha Pratim Ray on April 10 soon after the firing incident.
BJP had lodged a complaint with EC against Banerjee and submitted the audio tape that purportedly has her asking for the bodies of victims to be kept as she wants to hold a rally.
Trinamool too had moved the poll panel, questioning who authorised surveillance of the chief minister’s telephone conversations. The party had argued that the fact it was leaked from a BJP party office during polls made it incumbent upon EC to probe it.
Banerjee had ordered a CID inquiry into the incident to trace who was snooping on her calls.
BJP’s national IT cell chief Amit Malviya had released the audio clip last week. He had tweeted that Trinamool had planned to take out a procession with the victims’ bodies. The poll panel had placed a 72-hour embargo on politicians from visiting Sitalkuchi, as a result of which the CM could not travel there the day after the firing.
A senior officer said the state government had already ordered a CID probe into the Sitalkuchi incident.