Kolkata: Clearing the way for the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to take senior Trinamool Congress leader Anubrata Mandal to Delhi for questioning in a cattle smuggling case, the Calcutta High Court on Saturday dismissed a plea challenging the production warrant issued to him. Did it The special CBI court also ordered Mandal to pay a fine of Rs 1 lakh for forum shopping. Dismissing Mandal’s plea challenging the production warrant issued by the special CBI court in West Bengal’s Asansol, Justice Bibek Chowdhary directed that the TMC Birbhum district president be airlifted to Delhi. He directed that doctors posted in the Central Government’s Department of General Medicine, Cardiology and General Surgery in Kolkata would examine Mondal and issue a medical certificate stating the health status of the petitioner before handing him over to the ED.
Justice Chowdhary directed that a medical officer would accompany Mandal to Delhi and he would be medically examined by doctors soon after his arrival in the national capital.
It was directed that such medical papers be produced before the Trial Court at Delhi at the time of production before the Board.
The court noted that Mandal had approached the Calcutta and Delhi High Courts and resorted to forum shopping to prevent the ED from taking them to the national capital.
Justice Chowdhary also awarded a compensation of Rs one lakh to the High Court Legal Services Authority as compensation for putting an end to “the process of setting up successive, vexatious applications of similar nature before the highest seat of the judiciary of the two states of the country”. Directed to pay the costs of the court.”
The TMC leader was arrested by the ED in November last year. He was taken into custody by the CBI in August 2022 in a cattle smuggling case.
His counsel filed the petition claiming that the order on the basis of which Mandal’s transfer has been sought to Delhi is wrong in law and cannot be issued by the special judge of the CBI court in Asansol.