BREAKING : Suvendu Adhikari Moves Supreme Court To Transfer Mamata Banerjee's Election Petition From Calcutta High Court

BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari has moved the Supreme Court seeking transfer of the election petition filed by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee out of the State of West Bengal.

The Chief Minister had moved an Election Petition before the Calcutta High Court challenging Suvendu Adhikari's election win from the Nandigram constituency in the West Bengal Assembly Polls.

In a hearing that took place today, Calcutta High Court's Justice Shampa Sarkar had issued notice to Suvendu Adhikari, the elected candidate of BJP and directed that the records and papers in relation to the election be preserved during the pendency of the petition.

"Let notice be issued. The matter is made returnable on August 12, 2021. Pending the decision of the case, all documents, election papers, devices, video recordings etc connected with the election which is under challenge before this court shall be preserved by the concerned authority", the Order stated.

Banerjee's counsel, Senior Advocate Soumendra Nath Mookherjee, requested the bench to pass an interim order for preservation of records as the authorities are otherwise required to preserve them only for a period of 6 months after the election.

The case was assigned to Justice Shampa Sarkar after the recusal of Justice Kausik Chanda. Banerjee had objected to Justice Chanda hearing the petition on the apprehension of bias due to his association with BJP when he was a lawyer. Last week, Justice Chanda recused from hearing the case saying that "trouble mongers will keep the controversy alive if he does not recuse". Taking exception to the manner in which his recusal was sought, Justice Chanda had imposed a cost of Rupees 5 lakhs on Banerjee.