Narada Sting case: ED namesTMC leaders in chargesheet

The ED on Wednesday filed a chargesheet against the West Bengal Transport & Housing Minister Firhad Hakim, Panchayat Minister Subrata Mukherjee in the Narada sting operation case. The chargesheet filed before a special PMLA court in Kolkata also names former minister Madan Mitra, former Kolkata mayor Sovan Chatterjee and IPS officer SMH Meerza. The court directed that the summonses to Mukherjee, Hakim and Mitra be served through the office of the West Bengal assembly speaker as the trio are legislators. Summonses to the other two would be served directly at their addresses, the court said. The court  also ordered issuance of summons to the leaders and the appearance of the accused on November 16.

According to the ED, it was observed that the accused, despite being ministers and public servants, accepted bribes in lieu of favoring a company (fictitious). Money laundering was done to convert this bribe amount into white money. Journalist Mathew Samuel of Narada News, a web portal, had conducted a Narada sting operation in 2014 wherein some people resembling TMC ministers, MPs and MLAs were seen receiving money from representatives of a fictitious company in lieu of favours.