Sandeshkhali: CBI registers 3 cases against Shahjahan

KOLKATA: The CBI got Trinamul Congress strongman Shahjahan Sheikh’s custody from the West Bengal police on Wednesday evening, after taking over the probe into the violent mob attack on an Enforcement Directorate (ED) team during its raid on his house at Sandeshkhali in North 24 Parganas and filing three FIRs against him into the incident.

Shahjahan, the prime accused of violence in Sandeshkhali on January 5 this year, was handed over to the CBI by the CID at the state detective agency’s headquarters in Bhawani Bhavan, where he was kept under a 10-day remand, at around 6.40 pm.

The expelled TMC leader was later taken to the CBI office at Nizam Palace in south Kolkata for interrogation. He faces charges of the Indian Penal Code in the three cases.

His handover took place following a tug ofwar over his custody between the state government and the two Central agencies and a fresh order from the Calcutta high court.

During the day, the Central agencies’ counsels told a division bench of Justices Harish Tandon and Hiranmay Bhattacharya that the order of another division bench, comprising the chief justice T.S. Sivagnanam and Justice Hiranmay Bhattacharya, to the police to hand over Shahjahan by 4.30 pm on Tuesday, was challenged by the state government at the Supreme Court.

Later the division bench of Justices Tandon and Bhattacharya upheld the previous order and directed the state police to hand over Shahjahan to CBI by 4.15 pm of the day.