ED summons Mahua Moitra to Delhi; TMC calls it ‘harassment’

: With the Enforcement Directorate (ED) summoning Trinamool Congress’ (TMC) Krishnanagar candidate Mahua Moitra to their Delhi office on Thursday, the party has called it an attempt to harass her and foil her election campaign.

It was learnt that the ED has issued fresh summons to Moitra and Dubai-based businessman Darshan Hiranandani for questioning in a Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) contravention case on March 28, official sources said. Moitra has been summoned to their Delhi office.

TMC leader Sukhendu Sekhar Roy told the media that it is a harassment tactic by the Central agency. “The BJP is desperately trying to foil the campaign of Moitra realising that even after she was illegally removed from Parliament the party gave her a ticket because she is popular among the people of her constituency and she will emerge victorious in the polls.”

Party leader Shashi Panja said: “More than 6000 cases have been filed by these Central agencies and 96 per cent are against Opposition parties. However, the conviction rate is 0.02 per cent.”

The summon comes after a recent CBI raid at at least four properties of Moitra recently. Following the raid, she had written to the Election Commission of India (ECI) requesting to set up a framework on how these central probe agencies should conduct themselves when the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) is in effect due to elections.

She wrote: “Despite knowing about my candidacy, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has deliberately chosen to conduct four consecutive raids on four of my separate properties.

This was done with the sole intention of hindering my campaign process and creating a negative perception about me in the run-up to poll day. It is pertinent to mention that the so-called search and seizure operations conducted by the CBI resulted in absolutely zero fruition as the CBI admittedly went back empty-handed.”