Former minister Partha Chatterjee and Arpita Mukherjee will not make a physical appearance in court during their next production on August 31, a city court has ordered.
The court granted permission for their virtual production before the magistrate from inside the Presidency jail and Alipore Women’s Correctinal jail respectively. Monday’s order came on a petition by the Presidency jail superintendent who cited “security issues”.
The Presidency Correctional Home superintendent had submitted a written prayer stating: “In view of security ground, I am to submit before the Ld. Court that sending the said high security accused person physically for the production before the Ld. Court from this correctional home may cause a breach of security tremendously in respect of law and order situation.”
“Hence I would like to request before the Ld. Court to kindly accord necessary order for production of accused person Partha Chatterjee before the Ld. Court through virtual mode in lieu of physical mode or as the Ld. Court deems fit and proper.”
The court granted the plea for Chatterjee’s virtual appearance on August 31 and also added Mukherjee’s name to the virtual production category. The Enforcement Directorate, which arrested the two, has described Mukherjee as the former minister’s aide.
Lawyers for Chatterjee and Mukherjee, who are accused in a money laundering case related to the alleged irregularities in recruitments for government-aided schools, said they were “kept in the dark” about the reason for the order.
“I came to know about it today. We have filed an objection. The jail authorities have the right to seek such permissions, but we want to know what prompted them to do so,” said Sukanya Bhattacharya, lawyer for Chatterjee.
Mukherjee’s counsel Soham Bandopadhyay said: “The court cannot go beyond pleadings to pass orders. In the absence of any such application from the women’s correctional home, the court should not have passed the order in respect of Arpita.”
The move came two days after Chatterjee made a public statement — “Dal-er sathechhilam, dal-er sathei aachhi (I was with the party, I will be with the party)” — while being taken to hospital on Saturday. Earlier, after his court production, he was heard saying: “No one will be spared. No one will be spared.”
