Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee reacted sharply on Thursday to the raids by the Enforcement Directorate on the residence of state forest minister Jyotipriya Mallick, denouncing the BJP, ruling at the Centre, for misusing Central agencies to silence Opposition leaders.

The chief minister, who addressed the media at her Kalighat residence, also vowed that she won’t spare the ED if the minister’s health is adversely affected. Miss Banerjee said: “Every minister is busy with the Durga Puja carnival. Today the carnival will be held in the districts and tomorrow it will be held in Kolkata. Against this backdrop raids were conducted at the properties of the state forest minister,” she said. “I will not spare the ED if Mr Mallick falls sick,” Miss Banerjee said.

Advertisement

“He is suffering from high blood sugar and is not in the proper health condition… so if anything happens to him because of the unnecessary harassment, we will have to file FIRs against the ED officials,” the chief minister said. Mr Mallick’s Salt Lake residence in Kolkata was one of at least eight places that the central agency had searched as part of its ongoing probe in the multi-crore ration distribution irregularities case.

Miss Banerjee added: “Raids have been conducted at the house of the son of Rajasthan’s chief minister ahead of Assembly elections there.” She added: “I was told by the wife of Firhad Hakim that during the raid, ED officials had opened the safe and counted the number of sarees and cosmetics she has.” She was referring to a recent ED raid at the residence of Mr Hakim in connection with recruitment irregularities in state municipalities. Miss Banerjee said that the BJP, for all its efforts to scare the Opposition, will not be able to secure its position in next year’s Lok Sabha election.

“The Lok Sabha poll is six months away, and the BJP thinks that by putting all the Opposition leaders behind bars they will be able to ink victory. But the game is not so easy,” she said. The chief minister wondered why the ED or CBI do not conduct raids at the homes of BJP ministers and MPs.

“They are most corrupt and pathological liars. They are spared and the sole purpose of the BJP is to malign the Opposition leaders,” she said. Referring to the move by the BJP to change the country’s name to Bharat, she said: “Why are they so scared? We will use both the names, that is, India and Bharat. Our country is known as India across the globe. When our team takes part in sports outside, it is called the Indian team.”