Former West Bengal Chief Minister and Mamata Banerjee has received a major setback after CID officials reportedly arrived at her residence with a search warrant as part of an investigation into allegations of forged signatures of MLAs. The development comes amid reports of internal differences within the Trinamool Congress, adding to the political challenges facing the party leadership.
The probe is linked to an official letter submitted to Assembly Speaker Ratindra Bose, in which signatures of party legislators were allegedly forged. The letter reportedly claimed that all Trinamool Congress MLAs supported the appointment of Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay as the Leader of the Opposition. Allegations regarding the authenticity of the signatures subsequently led to the registration of the case and the launch of a CID investigation.
The controversy surfaced after Trinamool Congress MLAs Ritabrata Banerjee and Sandipan Saha met the Speaker on May 27 and raised objections over the document. The legislators reportedly stated that no resolution regarding the selection of the Opposition leader had been passed during a party meeting held on May 6.
The two MLAs further claimed that they had not signed any document on May 6 as mentioned in the letter. According to them, they signed the party meeting resolution book only on May 19. They alleged that the resolution said to have been adopted on May 6 was fabricated and did not reflect the actual decisions taken during the meeting.
The legislators also questioned the validity of several signatures in the document, noting that nearly 14 of the 70 signatures appeared in capital letters. Shortly after Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari publicly disclosed their identities, the Trinamool Congress expelled both MLAs from the party, accusing them of engaging in anti-party activities. The investigation is currently underway.