West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee on Saturday filed a caveat in the Supreme Court after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) moved the apex court in the Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) case.
By filing a caveat, the government has ensured that no adverse order would be passed against it without it being heard first.
This comes after the ED moved the Supreme Court with an Article 32 petition, alleging that CM Banerjee was interfering with their money laundering probe into a coal pilferage scam worth crores of rupees.
The Trinamool Congress (TMC) and the ED have been at loggerheads after Mamata Banerjee alleged that the Thursday raids at the residence of I-PAC head Pratik Jain were part of the BJP's "larger conspiracy" orchestrated with the agency ahead of the elections in the state.
CM Banerjee had also claimed on Thursday that she had "brought back" the "party's documents and hard disks" containing vital details of TMC candidates for the 2026 Assembly polls.
The ED, however, has denied these claims, stating that the raids—under Section 17 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002—had "no political motive", and that Jain had been included in the scope of the case due to “specific” evidence of his connection to certain hawala transactions and cash deals, as per a PTI report.
Tensions in the Calcutta HC hearing
This clash spilt over into the Calcutta High Court, where CM Banerjee's counsel stated that the articles seized during the ED raids had "no proximate, causal, or even remote" connection to alleged crimes, nor did they "fall within the scope of investigation under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002". They also reiterated that the seized articles were related to "electioneering purposes in the forthcoming West Bengal Legislative Assembly Election, 2026".
The counsel also said that the seizure of documents infringed the TMC's right of privacy under Article 21 and its right to participate in the democratic process under Article 19, as the party was registered under the Representation of People’s Act.
To counter that, the ED had filed a writ petition meant “to instil public confidence in the functioning of the State Government and to immediately prevent the over-action of the State Police and the Honourable Chief Minister of the State, Ms Mamata Banerjee".
It also reiterated that Mamata Banerjee's attempt to move to take away evidence key to the coal scam case during the raids on the I-PAC office and Jain's residence was a “blatant disregard of the law".
However, “enormous disturbance and commotion” in the courtroom caused Justice Suvra Ghosh to defer the case to January 14, prompting the ED to approach the Supreme Court.
Seeing her calls to order go "on deaf ears", Justice Ghosh had even walked out of the courtroom shortly after deferring the case.
Other cases
Apart from these legal battles, CM Mamata Banerjee has also filed two FIRs—one in the Electronics Complex Police Station, which comes under the Bidhannagar police commissionerate’s jurisdiction, and the other at the Shakespeare Sarani Police Station, which is under the Kolkata Police jurisdiction.
Another suo moto case has been filed by the police. The charges include criminal trespassing, wrongful confinement, criminal intimidation, obstruction of on-duty public servant (non-bailable offence), as well as a charge under Section 66 of the IT Act which amounts to stealing of information (non-bailable).
With inputs from Prema Rajaram