Calcutta High Court stays FIR against Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay; cites Arvind Kejriwal order

The Calcutta High Court on May 17 stayed the first information report (FIR) lodged by the West Bengal police against the former judge and now BJP leader Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay booked for allegedly assaulting protesting teachers..Single-judge Justice Tirthankar Ghosh took into account the nature of the allegations made in the letter of complaint addressed to the Inspector-in-charge of Tamluk police station and noted that so far as Gangopadhyay was concerned, the allegations against him in the First Information Report (FIR) were of abetment.The judge also referred to the recent order of the Supreme Court granting interim bail to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal for campaigning during the ongoing Lok Sabha elections.The High Court noted that the Supreme Court in Kejriwal case had taken into account general elections to Lok Sabha where there is participation of 650-700 million voters to elect the government of the country for the next five years."Having considered the view of the Supreme Court in Arvind Kejriwal's case and also the observation of the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Tamluk, Purba Medinipur in respect of the case diary produced before the said court, as well as the fact that Gangopadhyay is a contesting candidate from 30-Tamluk Parliamentary Constituency, I am of the opinion that the observations of the Supreme Court in the case of Arvind Kejriwal (supra) squarely applies to this case," Justice Ghosh held.With these observations, the single-judge stayed the FIR and other proceedings against Gangopadhyay and also against BJP general secretary of the Tamluk constituency, till June 14.The State was ordered to file its affidavit opposing the plea by June 12, when the matter would be next heard.The State police had lodged the FIR against Gangopadhyay for allegedly assaulting dismissed school employees at their protest site.Gangopadhyay was booked for attempt to murder and other offences under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) after a complaint by certain teaching and non-teaching staff members who lost their jobs following a ruling from the Calcutta High Court in the school jobs for cash scam case..The altercation reportedly took place on May 4 when Gangopadhyay, accompanied by party colleague Suvendu Adhikari, spearheaded a rally before submitting his nomination papers for the Tamluk Lok Sabha seat.Throughout the rally, certain BJP supporters allegedly assaulted teachers who were protesting after they lost their jobs in the wake of the High Court ruling..On May 14, another judge Justice Jay Sengupta had recused himself from hearing the plea filed by the former judge, stating that he knows Justice Gangopadhyay very closely.Accordingly, he had ordered that the matter be placed before Chief Justice TS Sivagnanam, who assigned the matter to the bench presided over by Justice Ghosh..The case was mentioned on May 13 by Gangopadhyay's counsel, advocate Rajdeep Majumdar, who alleged that the first information report (FIR) was politically motivated to stop Gangopadhyay from campaigning for the ongoing 2024 Lok Sabha elections.The plea besides seeking the quashing of the FIR, has also sought directions to set up a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to look into the matter.On May 14, another judge Justice Jay Sengupta had recused himself from hearing the plea filed by the former judge, stating that he knows Justice Gangopadhyay very closely.Accordingly, he had ordered that the matter be placed before Chief Justice TS Sivagnanam, who assigned the matter to the bench presided over by Justice Ghosh..Advocates Rajdeep Mazumder, Billawadal Bhattacharyya, Moyukh Mukherjee, Pritam Roy, Anish Kr. Mukherjee, S Bhattacharjee, Sagnika Banerjee, Aishwaryya Bazaz and Triparna Roy appeared for the Petitioner.Advocate General Kishore Dutta and Senior Standing Counsel Amitesh Banerjee along with Advocates Sirsanya Bandopadhyay, Rudrajit Sarkar and RK Ganguly represented the Stated..[Read Order]