Dear friends.

Just before 2 to 3 months, the CBI had shown some fundamental activities at some places of West Bengal by curtailing the freedom of 4 leaders of “TMC”. The Chief Minister Mamta Banerjee as usual started to make unwarranted noise.  CM Mamta Banerjee had also enjoyed the “Dharna” festival for a period of 6 hours just in front of the CBI’s Building in order to oppose the legal action of the law enforcement agency. The TMC workers had also enjoyed the game of stone pelting as well as destroying the peace and harmony as well as targeting the CBI officers.

When I queried regarding the said cultural activities of Mamta Banerjee and her party workers, I came to know that during the course of discharging their legal duties, the officers of the CBI have arrested 4 leaders of TMC in connection with “NARDA STING OPERATION” case and due to this Mamta Banerjee manifested herself as angry old lady and started to use her all available tectorial power to prevent the officers of CBI from performing their duties.

Let us discuss, what is the issue of “Narda Sting Operation”? 

Are you able to recollect some names like Tarun Tejpal or Tahlka etc.? No, perhaps it is difficult to remember but now we are going to snatch the threads of a Shirt which is old but still meaningful and beneficial. 

1:-     Mr. Tarun Tejpal is an Indian journalist, publisher and novelist. In 1980s he began his career with the English newspaper known as “The Indian Express” and later moved to New Delhi to join a now defunct magazine called “India 2000”.

In 1984, he joined a well-established media group through “India Today” magazine, then “The Financial Express” in 1994 and later became the founding editor of India’s second largest newsmagazine publication, Outlook. Meanwhile, he founded a publishing company, “India Ink”, which published Arundhati Roy’s Booker Prize winning Novel “The God of Small Things in 1998.

2:-     Mr. Aniruddha Bahal was born in Allahabad now known as Prayagraj and is a university graduate. He moved to Delhi in 1991 where he began his journalistic career by writing and editing some articles at the Outlook and the India Today.

3:-     Tehelka is an Indian news magazine known for its investigative Journalism and sting operations. According to the British newspaper The Independent, the Tehelka was founded by Mr. Tarun Tejpal and Mr. Anirudh Bahal and another colleague who worked together at the Outlook magazine after “an investor with deep pockets” agreed to underwrite their start up.

Mr. Aniruddha Bahal left Tehelka in 2005 to start “Cobrapost” – an Indian news website, after which Tehelka was managed by Tejpal through 2013. 

PERILOUS MOMENT FOR TARUN TEJPAL:-

“THiNK Fest” was started in 2011 as an annual literary festival and promoted as an event of Tehelka, though the program was run by an organisation called Thinkworks Pvt Ltd, a company owned by Tejpal, his sister Neena and managing editor Shoma Chaudhari. It featured Bollywood actors, global thinkers and sessions on new technology.

According to The New York Times, during a Tehelka organized “Think Fest” event in November 2013, a staff reporter of Tehelka accused Mr. Tarun Tejpal of rape and repeated sexual assault.

Mr. Tarun Tejpal was arrested by Goa police and he stepped aside as editor of Tehelka and his colleague Shoma Chaudhary resigned from Tehelka on 28 November because of the incident. In 2014, Mr. Mathew Samuel (The Key weapon and mastermind of Narda Sting operation) became the managing editor of Tehelka. In March 2016, Mr. Charanjit Ahuja became the editor of the fortnightly.

NARDA STING OPERATION

Mr. Mathew Samuel was born in a Christian family in Pathanapuram, Kerala. He attended St. Stephens College Pathanapuram, was active in politics, and was the college union secretary.

He worked in Delhi for Mangalam newspaper and Midday for a short period. He later joined Tehelka as a staff reporter, and became managing editor in 2014. He resigned from Tehelka in February 2016 to start his own news venture, Narda News.

The Narada sting operation was conducted by Narada news founder Mr. Mathew Samuel for over two years in West Bengal. Conducted in 2014 for the news magazine Tehelka, it was published on a private news website Narada News months before the 2016 West Bengal Assembly elections.

PREPARATION:-

As part of the operation, Mr. Mathew Samuel formed a made-up company named “Impex Consultancy Solutions” and approached several TMC ministers, MPs and leaders, asking them for favours in return for money.

During their investigation, Mr. Mathew Samuel and his colleague Mr. Angel Abraham collected footage and photographed of 52 hours. In the 52-hour footage photographed then TMC MPs Mr. Mukul Roy, Mr. Sougata Roy, Mrs. Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, Mr. Prasun Bannerjee, Mr. Suvendu Adhikari, Mr. Aparupa Poddar and Mr. Sultan Ahmad (he died in 2017), and state ministers Mr. Madan Mitra, Mr. Subrata Mukherjee and Mr. Firhad Hakim and Mr. Iqbal Ahmed were seen accepting alleged bribes in the form of wads of cash in exchange for extending unofficial favours for “Impex Consultancy Solutions”, which was hovered by Mr. Mathew Samuel himself.

IPS officer Mr. HMS Mirza (now suspended) was also seen taking cash from Mr. Mathew Samuel. TMC leader Mr. Shanku Deb Panda was also seen asking for shares in Samuel’s fictitious company in exchange of promised favours.

Although Mr. Mukul Roy (who is now the national vice-president of the BJP) was not seen accepting cash in the video but he was seen asking Samuel to visit his party office with the promised cash. Mr. Suvendu Adhikari is now a BJP leader and the Leader of the Opposition in state Assembly. Mr. Sovan Chatterjee had joined the BJP in 2019 but quit the party this year after he was denied a ticket for the Assembly polls. Mr. Panda is also with the BJP now.

Mr. Mathew Samuel claimed that Mr. K. D. Singh, TMC Rajya Sabha MP and majority owner of Tehelka, knew regarding the whole sting operation and funded the entire operation. Mr. Mathew Samuel claimed that the budget of the operation was initially set at ₹2,500,000 but was later increased to ₹8,000,000. Mr. K.D. Singh, however, refuted his involvement with any aspect of the sting.

THE ACTION OF STATE GOVERNMENT.

The state government initiated its own probe which booked Mr. Mathew Samuel under multiple sections of the IPC 469 (forgery to harm reputation), 500 (defamation), 120(B) (criminal conspiracy) etc. On August 5, 2016, the High Court stayed the state probe for ad infimum, observing that the police cannot run a concurrent investigation along with a court-monitored probe.

ENTRY OF CBI.

Soon, three Public-Interest Litigations from the Indian National Congress Party and BJP were filed in Calcutta High Court requesting for an impartial probe in light of the influential positions held by the accused. The State of West Bengal, along with the accused, asked for a probe by the state investigation team or by a special investigation team, while the petitioner pushed for a probe by a central agency.

On March 17, 2017, the hon’ble High Court at Calcutta was pleased to order that a preliminary probe will be conducted by the CBI. The court also directed the CBI to register an FIR against those who were involved in the case, if required.

The Supreme Court of India also rejected an appeal by the state, allowing the CBI probe to continue.

On March 18, 2017, the state initiated disciplinary proceedings against the IPS officer Mr. SMH Mirza.

On April 16, 2017, a FIR was registered by the CBI filed against 12 Trinamool Congress Party’s leaders for “criminal conspiracy” and other offences under Section 120 B of IPC (criminal conspiracy), Section 13 (2), 13 (1D) and Section 7 of Prevention of Corruption Act. The CBI also subsequently summoned all of the leaders involved to assist in the investigation.

As per the information spread on the different platforms of the social media, the investigation subsequently hit a road-block as certain portions of the footage (a prior to the) were found to be missing from the submitted footage. Mr. Mathew Samuel claimed to have deleted the non-necessary parts of the footage, whilst transferring them to the laptop from his iPhone and to have forgotten the password for the iPhone folder, which contained the cut-out portions. The CBI subsequently contacted Apple Inc. to retrieve the contents of the folder but whilst denying to share the password citing privacy requirements, they confirmed that the entire sting-footage had indeed been shot by an iPhone. Recent developments indicated that the CBI was in touch with professional hackers to gain access to the folder.

Entry OF ED

The Enforcement Directorate is also running a parallel investigation. It has lodged a case about misappropriation of public funds under Anti-Corruption-Act and has issued multiple summons to the accused and Mr. Mathew Samuel, himself.

LOK SABHA ETHICS COMMITTEE

Since the sting operation involved Members of Parliament and hence a Lok Sabha ethics committee was also set up to initiate a probe to determine if the persons committed a breach of privilege of the house concerned.

On May 9, 2021, West Bengal Governor Mr. Jagdeep Dhankhar, sanctioned the prosecution of Subrata Mukherjee, Firhad Hakim, Madan Mitra and Sovan Chatterjee by considering the relevant request placed by the CBI before him as the”Honourable governor is the competent authority to accord sanction in terms of law as he happens to be the appointing authority for such ministers in terms of Article 164 of the Constitution,”.

THE APPROACH OF THE TMC LEADERS.

The Trinamool Congress initially denied any connection with the sting operation, alleging it to be a product of political conspiracy and the video to be entirely forged. Trinamool party supremo and the Chief Minister of West Bengal- Mamata Banerjee alleged it to be a smear campaign by the opposition manifesting from vendetta-politics.

Later, the Trinamool Congress claimed that the money received was in the form of a donation. The subsequent CBI investigations were branded as witch-hunts and to be a product of vested political interests. Trinamool MP Mr. Dinesh Trivedi was noted to be a dissenting voice and asked for the resignation of the accused.

DISCLAIMER : The Article is based upon the material available on the internet and different platforms of social media. Hence be pleased to use your wisdom and knowledge to make understand yourself regarding the issue.

Nagendra Pratap Singh (Advocate)

aryan_innag@yahoo.co.in