West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday led a protest march against the Enforcement Directorate’s searches at the residence and offices of I-PAC chief Pratik Jain in the state capital Kolkata.
Accompanied by senior Trinamool Congress (TMC) leaders, ministers, MPs, MLAs and a large number of supporters, Banerjee started the march from the 8B Bus Stand area, amid sloganeering against the BJP-led central government, accusing it of “misusing central agencies for political vendetta” ahead of the 2026 assembly elections.
Videos of the same have emerged on social media. Watch here:
The rally, which is proceeding towards Hazra More, comes a day after Mamata Banerjee’s dramatic visit on Thursday to Jain’s Loudon Street residence during a search operation by the ED.
{{/usCountry}}The rally, which is proceeding towards Hazra More, comes a day after Mamata Banerjee’s dramatic visit on Thursday to Jain’s Loudon Street residence during a search operation by the ED.
{{/usCountry}}The TMC supremo had alleged that the agency was attempting to seize the party’s internal documents, hard disks and confidential organisational data unrelated to any financial investigation.
Mamata Banerjee lashes out at the BJP as TMC MPs detained
Earlier, Mamata Banerjee lashed out at the centre and the BJP after TMC MPs Mahua Moitra, Derek O’Brien, among others, were detained outside union home minister Amit Shah’s office while protesting against the ED raids on the I-PAC chief Pratik Jain’s Kolkata home.
Banerjee said that the treatment meted out to the MPs was “arrogance in uniform”.
“I strongly condemn the shameful and unacceptable treatment meted out to our Members of Parliament. Dragging elected representatives on the streets for exercising their democratic right to protest outside the Home Minister’s office is not law enforcement - it is arrogance in uniform. This is a democracy, not the BJP’s private property,” the West Bengal CM wrote on X.
Several TMC MPs were detained on Friday while staging a protest outside Shah's office in New Delhi, against the alleged misuse of probe agencies by the Centre. TMC leaders were forcefully evicted from the spot by Delhi Police, with MPs being dragged and physically carried away by police personnel.