Kolkata, Aug 17 (IANS) A single-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court, on Monday, extended the interim protection from coercive police action, including arrest, for the Trinamool Congress general secretary and the party’s Diamond Harbour Lok Sabha member, Abhishek Banerjee, in the ongoing CID investigation into the legislators’ signature mismatch case. The matter was heard at the single-judge bench of Justice Kaushik Chanda. At the end of the hearing, Justice Chanda extended the current interim protection till November 30.The state Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the state police is investigating allegations of forged signatures of multiple party MLAs on an official document submitted to the Assembly Speaker.While arguing the matter on behalf of the police, the state’s Additional Advocate General (AAG), Rajdeep Majumdar, informed the court that forensic examination has revealed that the signatures of three MLAs were forged.

Majumdar also informed the court that the document carried signatures of 70 legislators, out of which the complaints were about forged signatures of five legislators. Of the five legislators, the signatures of three have been forged as revealed in the forensic report, Majumdar informed the court.He also informed the court that the signature forgery was done in the presence of Abhishek Banerjee.“No resolution was made on May 6. Yet it was written that the resolution was made on that day. The MLAs were not even asked to sign the resolution on that day. It was signed on May 19 in reality. But the resolution written on the General Secretary's pad on May 6 was sent to the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly. In view of which, five MLAs gave statements and stated that their signatures were forged. The truth of that forgery has come to light in the forensic report,” the AAG argued.However, even after his argument, the court observed that, preliminarily, it was not feeling that Abhishek was involved in the signature forgery.

/IANS