Kolkata, Jun 24 The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday granted conditional anticipatory bail to former TMC MLA and singer Aditi Munshi in a case related to alleged acquisition of disproportionate assets, but refused similar relief to her husband, who is also an accused in the case.
Justice Jay Sengupta granted anticipatory bail to Munshi, former MLA from Rajarhat Gopalpur, noting that she is a woman and is currently caring for a four-month-old infant.
The prosecution claimed that unexplained assets worth more than Rs 100 crore connected to the couple have come to light during the investigation.
The court, however, refused the anticipatory bail prayer of her husband, Debraj Chakraborty, who is a TMC councillor of Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation.
After hearing their pre-arrest bail pleas in connection with an FIR lodged at Baguiati police station following a complaint by BJP MLA Tarunjyoti Tewari, Justice Sengupta directed the singer-politician to deposit her passport with the jurisdictional court forthwith and barred her from travelling abroad without prior permission of the court.
She was also directed to stay outside the jurisdiction of Baguiati police station till the completion of investigation and not influence or get in touch with the witnesses of this case.
Seeking anticipatory bail for the politician couple, their lawyer stated that the allegation against them is of acquiring properties from undisclosed income and disposing of a bulk of such assets immediately before an affidavit was to be filed before the Election Commission.
Munshi was a TMC candidate from Rajarhat Gopalpur for re-election, but lost the poll to Tewari.
Claiming that transferring property is not illegal, their counsel, Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, stated before the court that no case for organised crime has been made out because there is no allegation of extortion or land grabbing.
He stated that the Income Tax authorities would be at liberty to take appropriate action if the issue is about penalising someone for not disclosing income.
Opposing the anticipatory bail prayer of the two, additional advocate general Rajdeep Majumdar stated before the court that charges of land grabbing and extortion were added against them in the course of the investigation.
Arguing that the petitioners had amassed properties many times greater than their disclosed sources of income, he claimed that to avoid disclosure of such facts before the public, on a particular day, several properties were disposed of, some by way of a benami transaction, some by way of gifts, and some by undervaluing the properties.
Majumdar stated that the aim was to present a cleaner affidavit of assets for the elections, maintaining that unexplained assets worth more than Rs 100 crore have come to light during the investigation.
Giving an instance, the AAG stated that a five-acre parcel of land in Kalimpong was conveyed to a family friend for just Rs 19 lakh.
Maintaining that the investigating agency is considering adding provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act in this case, he stated that custodial interrogation of the petitioners is required for the sake of effective investigation.
