Kolkata, Sep 11 (IANS) A single-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court on Friday put an interim stay on the notice issued by the West Bengal Fire Services department last week, ordering immediate vacation of the Trinamool Congress General secretary and the party’s Diamond Harbour Lok Sabha member Abhishek Banerjee at Camac Street in Kolkata.
On September 4, the state fire services department served the vacation notice on grounds that the said office at the seventh and eighth floors of that building at Camac Street failed to comply with fire safety regulations.
In the notice, a written response has been sought within 48 hours, citing six types of irregularities in the fire safety system.
The Trinamool Congress, in due course, approached the Calcutta High Court, challenging the vacation notice.
The matter came up for hearing at the Calcutta High Court’s single-judge bench of Justice Krishna Rao.
At the end of the hearing, Justice Rao’s bench had put an interim stay on the vacation notice till September 16.
On that day, the single-judge bench will pass the judgment in the matter.
Trinamool Congress’ counsel and the former West Bengal Advocate General, Kishor Dutta, said that the vindictive nature of the vacation notice was evident from the fact that only the seventh and eighth floor of the building, which houses Abhishek Banerjee’s office, had been declared unsafe as the fire safety norms are concerned.
In his counter argument, the current West Bengal Advocate General, Surajit Nath Mitra, said that the fire alarms were not operating at the seventh and eighth floors of the building, where the party office was situated.
He also added that the numbers of fire sprinklers at these two floors were much lesser compared to other floors of the building.
The counsel for the building owner, Rama Devi Goenka, told the court that the occupants of the seventh and eight floors had set up a cafeteria there without taking prior approval from the building owner.
Finally at the end of the hearing, Justice Rao’s bench had put an interim stay on the vacation notice till September 16, when the judgment in the case will be pronounced.
The said Camac Street office had already been in the middle of controversy since last month.
Tension broke out on Camac Street on August 27 after Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) staff, accompanied by police personnel, reached the Trinamool Congress General Secretary’s Camac Street office to remove the illegal billboard.
The KMC staff and police personnel faced stiff resistance from Trinamool Congress activists led by Abhishek Banerjee, Derek O’Brien and other party leaders.
Scuffles broke out between the police personnel and the Trinamool Congress activists.
In the three FIRs filed at the Shakespeare Sarani Police Station, the Kolkata police have accused the Trinamool Congress activists of not only assaulting the on-duty police officers but also attempting to outrage the modesty of a female police officer.
In two of the three FIRs filed, Abhishek Banerjee, O’Brien and other Trinamool Congress leaders, such as Humayun Kabir and Baishwanar Chatterjee, were named.
The police have arrested 14 people in this connection so far.
Abhishek Banerjee, O’Brien and Abhishek Banerjee’s personal assistant Sumit Roy had already been questioned by the Kolkata police in the matter.
–IANS
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