Calcutta, June 20: Calcutta High Court today asked the government to “inform” it tomorrow why the state has not given approval to the CBI to initiate a trial against the six policemen and six administrative officials the agency has named in connection with the 2007 Nandigram police firing.

A division bench of Justices Ashim Kumar Banerjee and Mrinal Kanti Chowdhury gave the order after the CBI counsel, Himangshu Dey, told the court today that “trial against the accused could not be started as the state government did not give an assent”.

Justice Banerjee, the senior judge of the division bench, said: “The state lawyer is directed to appear in the hearing of the case tomorrow and inform the court why his client has not given an approval to the CBI to initiate a trial.”

CBI counsel Dey told the bench: “On December 5 last year, when the agency first approached the state for its approval to initiate the trial, the government had sought certain clarifications from my client.”

The lawyer said although the CBI submitted the clarifications on April 17 this year, the government “still did not give its approval”.

Justice Banerjee then called the state lawyer, Pradip Talukdar, who had by then left the court. So, the judge passed an order directing the lawyer to inform the bench about the state’s stand on the approval.

Although the CBI counsel did not inform the court what clarifications the government had sought from the agency, an agency source said the state wanted to know why Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, the then chief minister, was not made an accused in the case.

Among the 12 accused, two IPS officers and a police inspector were found “directly” responsible for the firing.