An embattled Abhishek Banerjee stepped out of his home, stood on the pavement, and hit back at police’s attempts to suggest that he was playing cat-and-mouse with them.

After questioning the Trinamool No. 2 for five-and-a-half hours until 11.30pm on Thursday, CID personnel were back at his doorstep on Friday afternoon to hand him a summons in another case. They insisted on serving it to him in person, though he was not at home.

On his return, Abhishek stepped into the middle of a circle of waiting journalists and said the CID had to either inform him of its visits in advance or wait for his return if it was so important for its personnel to meet him in person.

Friday's summons were related to an allegedly inflammatory election speech.

Abhishek asked why, if it were inflammatory, he was not booked by the Election Commission, then in charge of the state's law and order.

In that speech, Abhishek had said that DJ music would be played instead of Rabindrasangeet after May 4, results day — a comment construed as a call to violence by some.

"If I had spoken about playing DJ after the elections, the Union home minister had said TMC men would be hung upside down," the three-term MP said.

"Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. The ECI knew that if they started a case against Abhishek Banerjee, they would have to do the same against Amit Shah. But Gyanesh Kumar (the chief election commissioner) did not have the guts to do that."

He added: "Now the government has changed; therefore these cases. If there is an FIR because I had said that we would play the DJ, why will there not be an FIR against Amit Shah?"

A collective roar of approval broke out from a small group of Trinamool supporters as Abhishek spoke. Political observers said such vociferous support had mostly been missing since the party's election debacle.

In a campaign marked by vitriolic speeches from all sides, Union home minister Shah had threatened to "hang goons upside down" to set them straight.

The CID team waited outside Abhishek’s home for over two hours until he returned from Mamata Banerjee’s home.

The team, which had refused to hand the summons to anyone other than Abhishek and was waiting a few yards away when he returned, sent the summons inside the building. It was returned to them with Abhishek’s signature.

It was not immediately clear if Abhishek had personally collected the summons from the CID sleuths.

Trinamool MLA Kunal Ghosh has also been called for questioning around the same time.

On June 16, Abhishek has to appear in a probe into the “DJ” comment.

Kalyan outreach

Abhishek’s voice turned soft on Friday as he spoke about Kalyan Banerjee, veteran Trinamool MP who has asked Mamata to choose between him and her nephew after accusing the young man of arrogance and being the reason for the electoral rout. “The senior leadership who have spoken against me — you can directly mention Kalyan Bandopadhyay. He has every right to speak about me. He has every right to say a bad thing about me,” Abhishek said.

“He has groomed me since I was young. He may have felt bad about any particular incident that he has mentioned. But I have no personal anger against him. I always respected him; I still respect him.”

Reacting to Abhishek’s remarks, Kalyan told PTI: “I welcome his statement. He is just like my son. It is good that he has understood his mistake. All of us have to work and fight together against the BJP.”

Abhishek’s Friday avatar has been his most combative since May 4. On May 30, he was assaulted by a mob on his way to Sonarpur to visit the home of a Trinamool worker killed in post-poll violence. Visibly shaken, he had then alleged that the attack had been planned and carried out at the BJP’s behest.

Earlier this week, Mamata and Abhishek were in Delhi to attend the INDIA bloc’s meeting. Three successive meetings between the first families of the Congress and Trinamool set off speculation about Mamata returning to the Grand Old Party at a time her political legacy is threatened, first by electoral defeat and then by desertions.

Mamata returned to Calcutta on Wednesday but Abhishek did not. His detractors said he feared arrest.

On Friday, Abhishek said he was not afraid and underlined that the party had won 41% of the votes despite the SIR. “We are familiar with this type of pressure tactics. This won’t work. You have conducted the vote after deleting 30 lakh voters, yet the Trinamool Congress has got 41% of the votes,” he said.

“The Trinamool Congress has got 2.6 crore votes. The party will represent them. The party will not cede an inch. The CBI, CID, breaking the party, maligning, implicating workers in false cases, capturing party offices, breaking homes, bulldozing to suppress the party — nothing will scare us,” Abhishek went on, trying to lift party workers’ morale.

He suggested the latest change of guard in Bengal was different from the one in 2011, when Trinamool ended the Left’s 34-year rule.

“The TMC had broken the 34-year-old Left regime with the people’s blessings. Just see how different the 2011 poriborton was compared with the one now,” he said.

Abhishek accused the new government of having already disappointed the people’s expectations.

“If people have voted you to power, work for them. People have not voted for you to use bulldozers. People have voted for jobs, for peace and law and order; people have voted for development. Please do that. Bring funds from Delhi.”

He also spoke of his meeting with Rahul Gandhi in Delhi. “Please do not speculate. I had a meeting with Rahul Gandhi. There was no one else. The media is reporting whatever they want. Neither did I speak to the media, nor did Rahul Gandhi. From where, then, are you getting all this information?” Abhishek asked.