If you thought political rivalries were just about speeches and Twitter wars, think again. The drama between the West Bengal government and central agencies just hit a completely new level, and the details revealed in the Supreme Court today sound more like a crime thriller than a legal hearing.The “Heist” AccusationOn Thursday, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) told the Supreme Court a story that stunned everyone present. We know the ED has been investigating a massive coal smuggling scam. As part of this, they raided the Kolkata office of I-PAC (the political strategy group) and the home of its director, Pratik Jain.But according to Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, the raid didn’t go as planned. He told the court that while the ED officers were doing their job, the Chief Minister of West Bengal, Mamata Banerjee, physically arrived at the spot with a team of police officers.The accusation gets crazier: The ED claims that the CM and the police didn’t just stop the raid—they allegedly snatched away the evidence.Mehta told the judges, “They took the pendrives, the papers, and the digital devices we had seized. They just walked out with them.”The Supreme Court is Not HappyThe judges listening to this—Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra and Justice Vipul Pancholi—did not mince words. After hearing the ED’s side, the bench observed that if these allegations are true, it points to a state of “absolute lawlessness.”The Solicitor General argued that this wasn’t just interference; it was the state machinery obstructing a court-mandated investigation. He even demanded that the Chief Secretary and the Director General of Police (DGP) be suspended immediately for allowing this to happen. He famously remarked in court, “A state cannot just barge in, steal evidence, and then sit on a protest.”The Other Side of the CoinThe West Bengal government’s lawyers, of course, have a different take. They argued that the ED was using the coal scam as an excuse to seize election strategies and sensitive political data belonging to the Trinamool Congress (TMC). They claimed the “intervention” was necessary to protect political privacy, not to hide a scam.What Now?This is a massive constitutional headache. The Supreme Court has issued a notice to the Bengal government asking for an immediate explanation. They have also paused the FIRs that the Kolkata police had slapped on the ED officers.For the common person watching this, the question is simple: Where is the missing evidence now? Whether it was “stolen” or “protected” depends on who you believe, but one thing is clear—this fight is far from over.
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