The Trinamool Congress on Sunday said its general secretary Abhishek Banerjee’s helicopter was raided by Income Tax officials in Kolkata’s Behala flying club and alleged this was part of a deliberate ploy by the BJP to harass and intimidate opposition candidates whom they cannot engage with politically.
In a post on X, the party said the chopper was undergoing a trial run at Behala Flying Club for Banerjee’s visit to Haldia in Purba Medinipur when a team of IT officials arrived and extensively searched it.
“Instead of removing the @NIA_India DG and SP, @ECISVEEP and @BJP4India chose to deploy minions from IT to search and raid my chopper and security personnel today, resulting in no findings,” Banerjee said on X.
“When the Income Tax officials couldn’t find anything, a frustrated team of Mr. Modi’s men didn’t let the chopper fly. When Banerjee’s security personnel asked the reason, they (IT officials) engaged in a verbal spat and threatened to detain the chopper illegally. They opened each and every bag, searched every nook and corner of the chopper,” the party said.