KOLKATA: Hours after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested four Trinamool Congress (TMC) leaders, including two recently-inducted ministers, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee staged a sit-in protest in CBI's Kolkata office on May 17.
According to reports, CM Banerjee's spokesperson, lawyer Anindyo Raut said, "Didi (Banerjee) will not leave this CBI office until her party colleagues are released or until she is also arrested."
Further, he alleged that the CBI officers have arrested the four leaders, among them two sitting and two former ministers, without the mandatory notice. "These arrests are politically motivated and illegal.
It is to be mentioned here that the Trinamool leaders were arrested in connection with the 2016 Narada sting operation case.
The officials of the central agency visited the houses of these leaders and brought them for questioning at its office in Kolkata's Nizam Palace.
The arrested include ministers Firhad Hakim and Subrata Mukherjee, MLA Madan Mitra, and former Kolkata mayor Sovan Chatterjee. Notably, all four leaders were ministers in the previous TMC government when the Narada bribery tapes were released in 2014.
Trinamool MP and lawyer Kalyan Banerjee told the media that the party leaders had always cooperated with the CBI in these cases.
"Now the CBI says they have arrested the four because they are submitting the charge sheet against them. If they are submitting the charge sheet, that means the investigation is over. So why they need the leaders in custody and where is the mandatory notice of arrest! This is downright illegal and politically motivated, we will move the court and we have faith in it," Banerjee added.