TMC workers protest outside CBI office in Kolkata over ministers' arrest; CRPF deployed

KOLKATA: Hundreds of Trinamool Congress supporters gathered outside the CBI office here on Monday to protest against the arrest of two senior West Bengal ministers and others in connection with Narada sting operation case.

The supporters of the ruling party, waving TMC flags, raised slogans against the CBI and the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has arrived at the CBI office here after two of her cabinet colleagues and a TMC MLA were apprehended in the case.

A large posse of CRPF personnel barricaded the central government office complex in Nizam Palace, where the CBI office is located. Kolkata Police personnel were also present there in large numbers.

Earlier in the day, Bengal ministers Firhad Hakim and Subrata Mukherjee, TMC legislator Madan Mitra and former minister Sovan Chatterjee were arrested by the central agency in connection with the Narada sting case in which politicians were purportedly caught taking money on camera, officials said.

They said that the action comes as the central probe agency is likely to file its charge sheet in the case. Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar had recently granted sanction to prosecute all the four leaders, following which the CBI finalised its charge sheet and moved to arrest them.

Family members of the arrested leaders, including the daughter of Hakim, son of Mitra and Chatterjee's wife also went to the CBI office.

The sting operation was purportedly conducted by Mathew Samuel of Narada TV news channel in 2014 wherein some people resembling TMC ministers, MPs and MLAs were allegedly seen receiving money from representatives of a fictitious company in lieu of favours.

The tapes were made public just before the 2016 assembly elections in West Bengal. The Calcutta High Court had ordered a CBI probe into the sting operation in March, 2017.