Chandrima Bhattacharya (third from left) at the protest in front of the CBI office in Salt Lake on Thursday. Picture by Sanat Kr Sinha

Calcutta, Sept. 11: The ruling establishment today scored an own goal by deploying law minister Chandrima Bhattacharya to lead a Saradha-related protest outside the CBI office in Salt Lake.

Although the Trinamul leadership claimed that the demonstration against the way the central agency was conducting the probe was a success, the muscle-flexing prompted many to question the law-and-order situation.

“One doesn’t want to see the law minister on the streets. It gives an impression of uncertainty,” a senior IAS officer said.

Uncertainty on the law-and-order front is something the Mamata Banerjee government can ill afford at a time it is making efforts to attract investment, as part of which the chief minister visited Singapore last month.

As a follow-up to the visit, Mamata met the consular heads of Germany, France, Italy and the UK and the honorary consuls of several other countries at Nabanna today and urged them to support an investor summit that will be part of the Biswa Banga Sammelan on January 7 and 8.

After the 90-minute meeting, Amit Mitra said the session was successful and the consular representatives had promised to help the state organise the programme. During his stint as Ficci secretary-general, Mitra had successfully organised several such events. But as industries and finance minister, his challenge is to show results in terms of investments, which have eluded Bengal till now.

While Mamata, Mitra and senior officials were in the meeting, Bhattacharya was leading the demonstration organised by the women’s wing of Trinamul. The 400-odd women shouted slogans as a large contingent of policewomen stood by.

Personnel were also deployed in the heart of the city as those duped by cash-collection companies organised a rally.

“All these developments give an impression of uncertainty and instability. No foreign industrialist wants to invest in such a situation and domestic investors tend to go slow,” said the head of a Calcutta-based chamber of commerce.

Stability in political and legal terms, security and availability of land are among the key factors investors from Singapore will consider before investing in any Indian state, the southeast Asian country’s foreign and law minister K. Shanmugam had told this newspaper.

The street protest, many said, would send a wrong message to industry. Others pointed out that the agitation outside the investigating agency’s office in Salt Lake’s CGO Complex amounted to challenging the Supreme Court, which ordered the CBI probe into the Saradha scam.

Calcutta High Court lawyer Arunava Ghosh said law minister Bhattacharya, Assembly deputy Speaker Sonali Guha and Salt Lake municipality chairperson Krishna Chakraborty had violated the law by participating in the siege.

“Chandrima is an integral part of the council of ministers. She is duty-bound to uphold the rule of law. But she did just the opposite by taking part in the demonstration. This amounts to blocking the administration of justice,” Ghosh said. “What she did was absolutely unconstitutional,” he added.

Asked whether it was proper for the law minister to take part in a demonstration, Bhattacharya threatened a bigger agitation. “I have not come here as a law minister. I have come here simply as a Trinamul activist and will come again tomorrow. We will organise a bigger programme with more participants,” she said.

The Trinamul protesters blocked one flank of the road outside the CGO Complex. They, however, did not prevent CBI or Enforcement Directorate officers from entering the compound. The officers did not take chances and brought in Trinamul MP Kunal Ghosh and businessman Santanu Ghosh through a back gate.

Advocate Kaushik Chanda hit out at the law minister by saying: “CBI officers as government employees. Obstructing their work is a punishable offence under Section 353 of the IPC.”