Narada case: West Bengal Governor nod to CBI prosecution of 3 TMC MLAs

West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Sunday sanctioned the Central Bureau of Investigation’s (CBI) request to prosecute Trinamool Congress (TMC) MLAs Subrata Mukherjee, Firhad Hakim and Madan Mitra, and former TMC and BJP leader Sovan Chatterjee in the Narada sting case.

The governor’s announcement came on a day Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee named Mukherjee and Hakim Cabinet ministers in the new government.

While Mukherjee, Hakim, and Mitra won the recent elections, Chatterjee has severed ties with both the TMC and the BJP, which he had joined in 2019. The CBI claims that all four were caught accepting bribes on camera. The sting operation tapes were released ahead of the 2016 Assembly polls. They were allegedly filmed in 2014, when all four were ministers.

The Calcutta HC ordered a CBI probe in the case in March 2017. “Honourable governor is the competent authority to accord sanction in terms of law as he happens to be the appointing authority for such ministers in terms of Article 164 of the Constitution,” read a statement by Raj Bhavan’s officer on special duty for communication.