Kolkata, Oct 5 (IANS) : The “original but minority” faction of the Trinamool Congress led by former West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee, on Monday, approached a single-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court against the court-appointed special officer who is not permitting her to operate three party bank accounts.
In its petition filed before the single-judge bench of Justice Saugata Bhattacharyya, the Mamata faction accused the Special Judge Subrata Talukdar (retired) of not permitting withdrawal of money before the forthcoming Durga Puja festival. The petition said the faction is not able to pay house rents and even salaries to the office employees before the festive season as a result of this.
The Mamata Banerjee faction of Trinamool Congress has requested the court to allow the use of party funds from the three bank accounts and also sought an urgent hearing in the matter. Despite admitting the petition, Justice Bhattacharyya rejected the plea for an urgent hearing.
The matter is likely to be taken up after the court reopens following the festive vacation.
In the petition, the Trinamool Congress faction claimed that the court-appointed special officer has sought information on whether the new name and electoral symbol allotted to this faction were only for the bypolls for the Nandigram and Rejinagar Assembly Constituencies, scheduled for Tuesday.
The West Bengal Police had put the three accounts of the Trinamool Congress held with a private bank on freeze on charges of illegal transactions. Challenging the move, the Mamata Banerjee-led faction approached the Calcutta High Court.
The bench of Justice Bhattacharyya then appointed a special officer to manage those bank accounts. On July 9 this year, Justice Bhattacharyya ordered that the Mamata Banerjee-led faction of Trinamool Congress would have control over those bank accounts for the time being.
However, Justice Bhattacharyya further ruled that the faction would not be able to spend money unbridled and the court-appointed special officer will pay Trinamool Congress for its daily operations and salaries. Justice Bhattacharyya also ruled that this order will be in force till January 29 next year.
The matter was again heard last month. Since the accounts were held in the name of All India Trinamool Congress, neither of the two factions of Trinamool Congress should have the right to operate them, considering that the Election Commission of India (ECI) recently froze both the name “All India Trinamool Congress” and the party’s original electoral symbol of “Flowers & Grass”.
However, Justice Bhattacharyya did not accept the argument of the state government counsel on the grounds that the ECI decision pertained to the name and electoral symbol of the party and that the Commission’s decision was not final.
He maintained that the right of the Mamata Banerjee-led faction to use the account through the court-appointed special officer would continue till January 29, 2027.
