Centre unlikely to recommend President’s rule in West Bengal

After the “unprecedented” turn of events in Kolkata over the CBI’s bid to question City Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar in the Saradha chit fund scam on Sunday evening, the Centre is unlikely to recommend President’s rule in the State. Though Home Minister Rajnath Singh told the Lok Sabha on Monday that the incident “bordered on the failure of constitutional machinery”, senior officials said the situation was not grave enough to invoke Article 356 of the Constitution enabling President’s rule. The government has decided to tread cautiously on the subject of sending notices to Mr. Kumar. A senior Home Ministry official said it would seek a report on the role of the IPS officers on allegations of obstructing investigation and violation of service conduct rules. The Ministry is the cadre-controlling authority of IPS officers. A CBI team that had arrived at the residence of Mr. Kumar to question him in the Saradha scam was bundled into a vehicle by the Kolkata police and taken to the nearby police station. They were released later. The CBI headquarters in Kolkata and the residence of Joint Director Pankaj Srivastava was also surrounded by local police. The Ministry has not sought any explanation from the CBI on the Kolkata developments. “We will wait for the Supreme Court hearing on Tuesday before taking a decision on sending notices to the police officers in Kolkata. Their conduct violated service rules,” another official said. The Supreme Court said on Monday there was no evidence shown by the CBI in its application to back the claim that the Kolkata Police Commissioner was attempting to destroy electronic evidence in the chit fund cases. The SC said it will hear the CBI’s plea again on Tuesday. The official said the MHA was closely monitoring the situation. Earlier Mr. Singh called up Governor of West Bengal Keshari Nath Tripathi to be apprised of the facts in the incident of a central investigating agency being “manhandled, detained, intimidated and obstructed.” Source: The Hindu