Former Union minister Kapil Sibal on Saturday termed the Enforcement Directorate an “omnipresent prosecuting agency” that was being misused by the BJP to target Opposition leaders ahead of elections.
Questioning the timing of the ED raid on the I-PAC office in Calcutta, the Rajya Sabha member said the agency’s only motive was to harass the Mamata Banerjee government as the organisation was her party’s poll strategist.
“What was ED doing in the last few years? Now, before the elections, they remembered that they needed documents?” Sibal told a media conference here.
He cited examples of ED actions against Hemant Soren in Jharkhand and Lalu Prasad and Tejashwi Yadav in Bihar during the Assembly polls.
The ED said it had raided the office of I-PAC and the residence of its chief in Calcutta on Thursday in connection with a coal-smuggling case. The agency claimed that Mamata barged in during the raids and took away “key” evidence related to the probe.
Accusing the Centre of unleashing the probe agency on Opposition leaders to instil fear, Sibal said: “Wherever an FIR is registered, the ED reaches there, as it feels that it has the right to investigate everywhere. It is also interesting that the ED acts only where elections are held... The ED is omnipresent, like God. The ED is this government’s God and can do anything. The CBI is also the same.”
Asked about the ED’s allegation that the Bengal chief minister hindered the raids, Sibal said the agency should first tell what they were investigating.
“If they wanted documents related to the coal scam, at least that is what newspapers report, then they should have asked for access to computers... They suddenly remembered to collect documents during the election process. They want to create disturbance and their attitude and intention are clear — how to trouble the TMC and Mamata Banerjee as they (BJP) cannot win otherwise in Bengal,” he said.
Noting that he was pained at the developments in Bengal, Sibal said: “I do not want the unity and integrity of our country to be disturbed.”
He said the UPA government did not prosecute any political party or leader based on false information. Between 2004 and 2014, when the UPA was in power, the ED was never given such a free hand, he said.
“When the ED was constituted, we did not know that it was an omnipresent prosecuting agency which could go anywhere, anytime in the country. It can also attack the federal structure, like troubling Opposition leaders and making their governments fall, justified or not,” he added.