Partha’s legal counsel likely to move court over Guv’s prosecution sanction to CBI

Even as Governor CV Ananda Bose on Tuesday late evening gave the sanction to CBI for the prosecution of former education minister Partha Chatterjee, the latter’s legal team is likely to challenge this move on the ground that such sanction can only be given by the Speaker of the State Assembly.

Chatterjee, who is presently in judicial custody, was arrested last year in July. At the time of arrest, he was a Cabinet minister and an MLA. Soon after, he was stripped of his ministership by the party and was also suspended. The CBI is learnt to have filed a chargesheet last year in September and had sought prosecution sanction subsequently.

According to Section 19 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, previous sanction is necessary for prosecution. In the case of a person who is employed in connection with the affairs of a State, a state government’s nod is required for a court to take cognizance of charges. Chatterjee’s counsel reportedly said that such a sanction can only be given by the Speaker which did not happen in this case. Hence, it is

likely that a higher court will be moved against this decision. Sources said that in the past, there are instances where the governor is learnt to have given

sanction for prosecution. In 2021 when Jagdeep Dhankhar was the Governor of West Bengal, he had given such prosecution sanction to CBI for arresting ministers Firhad Hakim, Subrata Mukherjee, Madan Mitra and Sovan Chatterjee in the Narada case. It was so done because the governor was the authority who had appointed them as ministers. Responding to the argument that the prosecution sanction should instead have come from the Speaker, a legal expert highlighted that in 2021 during the hearing of a case where the Kerala government had submitted a plea that without the prior sanction from the Speaker the police cannot lodge FIR for offences under IPC against an MLA, the apex court had ruled that police does not need Speaker’s sanction to register FIRs for alleged criminal actions of MPs or MLAs.