The Trinamool Congress on Monday approached Calcutta High Court, seeking protection for leaders whose names appear on an Election Commission list of “troublemakers” that has been informally shared with police for action.
Senior advocate Kalyan Banerjee mentioned the matter before the bench of Chief Justice Sujoy Paul and sought intervention. The court admitted the plea and scheduled a hearing later this week.
“Around 800 names of our senior leaders and party workers feature on this list. It has been passed on to the police through police observers and they have been asked to arrest them. We are apprehensive about illegal arrests and have sought the court’s intervention,” Banerjee told Metro.
The first phase of polling is scheduled for April 23, with many of those named from constituencies in the first phase.
The Telegraph reported on Monday that the EC had drawn up the list, including several incumbent MLAs, senior Trinamool functionaries and municipal councillors, and shared it with police chiefs for action.
Among those named are Trinamool candidate from Behala West Ratna Chatterjee, party leader Paresh Paul from Beleghata, Kasba councillor Sushanta Ghosh, Swarup Biswas from Rashbehari, Ashoknagar MLA and candidate Narayan Goswami, and former Rajya Sabha member Santanu Sen from Cossipore-Belgachia.
In Bhabanipur, where chief minister Mamata Banerjee is contesting, more than 10 individuals have been listed as “troublemakers”. The names include Kumar Saha, whose residence was searched by a central agency last week.
Several Trinamool leaders described the list as “illegal”. A party leader in central Calcutta alleged that the names did not appear to be drawn from police records. “If that were the case, how are BJP leaders with multiple criminal cases not on the list?” he said.
Legal experts also raised concerns. Senior criminal lawyer Sk Salim Rahman said instructions to arrest or detain Trinamool leaders “based on someone’s whim is illegal”.
“There is no legal provision for preventive detention. And there is no provision to arrest anyone without a case that demands arrest. No one can be picked up because he or she is considered a threat before the elections. The law does not work on perceptions. Any action must be backed by legal provisions,” he said.