The Supreme Court on Wednesday stayed the FIR against West Bengal BJP leader Kabir Shankar Bose allegedly registered due to his personal and political rivalry with Trinamool Congress MP Kalyan Banerji.
The plea, filed by Bose, contended that the criminal proceedings should be quashed, as it has been maliciously instituted with an ulterior motive for wreaking vengeance on him due to private and personal grudges.
A bench comprising Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul, Dinesh Maheshwari, and Hrishikesh Roy, after examining the report filed by Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), also issued notice to the West Bengal government.
Earlier, the top court had asked the Centre to bring on record the special incident report filed by the CISF on the alleged scuffle between security staff of Bose and Trinamool Congress workers. The top court had also asked the Centre to file, in a sealed cover, the movement logbook of Bose on the day of the incident.
Bose has claimed that he has been specifically targeted by the West Bengal government and Bannerji due to the political and personal rivalry. He urged the top court to safeguard him from the threats to his life and liberty which he faces in the state. Against the backdrop of upcoming elections in the state, Bose claimed the state government is trying every possible tactic to obstruct him from campaigning.
Bose said an FIR was registered against him in December last year on the complaint of Santosh Kumar Singh under various sections of IPC for the alleged action of the CISF security for saving his life from the TMC “goons”. Another FIR was registered, related to the same incident, against him for outraging the modesty of a woman.
“That there are no specific allegations of causing injury upon the victims by using any lethal weapons in the FIR and there is no specific allegation of outraging the modesty of any women by the petitioner,” he said in his plea.
Bose claimed that on December 6, he and his CISF detail came under heavy attack and sloganeering from a mob led by Singh just outside his residence. As per protocol, the CISF personnel immediately took him to a secure location.
The plea claims for several hours, the entire building was under siege by over 200 TMC hooligans led by Banerji, and this action was supported by the state police. Later, when he went to the police station, the police officers said they under tremendous pressure to arrest him. Bose was arrested at the police station.
While granting him interim bail, the trial court recorded that neither any injury report nor any statement of victim has been recorded under Section 161 of Cr. P.C, it noted. “That there is a concerted approach of the State to harass the Petitioner due to political vendetta. In the present case, Respondent No 1 (West Bengal government) has used the police personnel which is under their direct control to register bogus cases against the petitioner,” the plea said.
Bose and five other BJP leaders had moved Supreme Court alleging a witch-hunt by the West Bengal Police at the behest of the ruling party and urged the top court to transfer all cases to an independent investigating agency.
