Cautious After Sandeshkhali Attack, ED Raids 3 TMC Leaders With More CRPF Men & Protection

A week after the Sandeshkhali incident, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) raided the residence of three Trinamool Congress (TMC) leaders, including the fire services minister, Sujit Bose, however, adopting a more cautious approach, said sources.

This time, the ED took along a team of 30 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) men. Sources said the ED not only increased the number of CRPF personnel in each raid, but also took along a special anti-riot kit with them. The entire CRPF team brought along lathis, guards, tear smoke munitions and guns with them. Special helmets and more guards were also brought in. The strategy was to have more equipped people in raid. Apart from the special protection, in a completely new concept, they are dominating the locality they are raiding. Nobody was allowed to gather in front of Bose’s residence.

ED sources told News18, “We were taken aback by the Sandeshkhali incident, we have to take protection, which is why this deployment."

Along with Bose, the ED raided the houses of TMC’s Baranagar MLA Tapas Roy and former North Dum Dum Municipality Chairman Subodh Chakraborty.

THE SANDESHKHALI INCIDENT

Last Friday, the ED faced protest and attacks at Sandeshkhali while raiding the residence of TMC leader Sheikh Shajahan and at Bongaon during the raid on another party leader Shankar Addyo. Three officers were injured in this incident.

Thereafter, the ED director came to Kolkata, had several rounds of meetings with ED and CRPF officers. Sources in the ED told News18 that in the internal meeting, the ED Director told officers to take along more force and be more cautious.

As Shajahan is a well-known leader in the area, the question raised was why the ED did not do more research before the raid.

In the past seven days, sources said the ED has changed its plan for raids.

THE ALLEGED MUNICIPAL SCAM

The Central agencies’ investigation into the recruitment scam in education led them to Ayan Sil, who had various OMR sheets related to municipality recruitment.

After examining these sheets, the ED began its investigation and found the other scam related to recruitment in municipalities. Friday’s raids were in connection to this case.

As the raids started, Bharatiya Janata Party’s Suvendhu Adhikary said, “The ED/CBI will reach out to all thieves. This is a normal action under the law of the land. Bose is directly involved in Municipality Recruitment Scam. Rightfully, the ED is raiding his house."

On the other hand, TMC General Secretary Kunal Ghosh said, “This is political vendetta of the BJP. They are not raiding Adhikary, but they are raiding our leaders."