ED tried to seize TMC’s internal data during raid at I-PAC chief’s house: Mamata

Kolkata, Jan 8: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday alleged that ED officials were attempting to seize TMC’s hard disks, internal documents and sensitive organisational data during a search operation at the residence of I-PAC chief Prateek Jain here.

Banerjee said the raid at the residence of Jain, whom she termed as the party’s IT chief, was “politically motivated and unconstitutional”.

“They have raided the residence of our IT chief. They were confiscating my party’s documents and hard disks, which has details about our candidates for the assembly polls. I have brought those back,” Banerjee told reporters. She accused the central agency of trying to take away hard disks, mobile phones, candidate lists and internal strategy documents of the ruling party. “Is it the duty of the ED to collect political party data?” the CM asked.

Apart from political consultancy for the TMC, I-PAC also looks after the IT and media cell of the party. Banerjee made the allegations after emerging from Jain’s Loudon Street residence here, where searches have been underway since Thursday morning. Search operations were also being conducted at the office of the Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC), the consultancy firm Jain heads. Claiming that the ED was trying to access the ruling party’s internal strategy, candidate lists and confidential digital material, Banerjee said such information had no link to any financial probe. Calling the exercise an act of intimidation, Banerjee said, “This is not law enforcement, this is political vendetta. The home minister is behaving like the nastiest home minister, not someone who protects the country.” The exact nature of the searches and details of the case being probed were not immediately clear. There was no official statement from the ED or the I-PAC till the filing of this report.