Senior Advocate and Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Rajya Sabha MP Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya on Wednesday moved the Calcutta High Court seeking contempt proceedings against West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for her comments at a public event in which she asked the judiciary to not terminate the jobs secured via the recruitment scam using illegal means.
Mr. Bhattacharya said before a Division Bench of Justices T.S. Sivagnanam and Justice Hiranmoy Bhattacharya that suo motu contempt against Ms. Banerjee be initiated. The Bench asked Mr. Bhattacharya to file an affidavit in the matter before the court by Thursday, following which the court would decide whether the contempt petition would be allowed or not.
According to the advocate, the remarks made by the Chief Minister amounted to direct interference with the process of administration of justice. “The matter is still undergoing the judicial process. In such a situation, such a comment by the Chief Minister from a public programme was unwarranted and tantamount to contempt of court,” Mr. Bhattacharya added.
Participating in an event organised by the Alipore Bar Association, the Chief Minister said on Tuesday: “Please do not take away jobs at the drop of the hat. This is not politics.” Ms. Banerjee urged that the jobs where services had been terminated in the recruitment scam should be given back legally “If required, they can appear in the examination again. Or the court can make some arrangements,” she said. Her remarks were criticised by her political opponents, who alleged that she was trying to encourage “illegality and corruption” with such remarks.
More than 4,000 persons have lost their jobs because irregularities in the process of their appointment were revealed during the ongoing investigation into the West Bengal recruitment scam. Some of those who lost their jobs have appealed before a Division Bench of the High Court. The recruitment scam in which over dozen of officials, including Trinamool Congress functionaries, are behind bars has rocked the politics of the State.
