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KOLKATA: A CID team reached the Harish Chatterjee Street flat of Mamata Banerjee’s niece Aditi Gayen on Thursday in connection with an FIR against her cousin and Trinamool national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee over his “DJ” remark during speeches ahead of the assembly polls. The 10 member team arrived around 2pm and spoke to Aditi for an hour. A source said the investigators wanted to verify certain information received from Abhishek and also to know how TMC social media pages worked. Abhishek was questioned by CID for six and a half hours on Tuesday in connection with the case.“As part of Abhishek’s social media team, Aditi uploads his speeches. We wanted to verify certainthings... The questions also revolved around social media use — Facebook Lives, uploads on X and video uploads.
She, along with her family, cooperated. It is, however, too early to say if she will be made a witness in this case,” said the source who is also a part of the investigating team.Sources said CID has identified potentialwitnesses in the case and will gradually reach out to all of them. “We have asked Aditi for contacts of people present at six places where Abhishek is accused of making the remarks. We also wanted to know if the ‘DJ’ remark video was uploaded on Abhishek’s instructions or posted by his PR team without his knowledge,” said a source.
Aditi is the daughter of Mamata’s sister Rina Gayen.‘Why action only against us? Bid to silence oppn’In his speeches, Abhishek had allegedly said DJ boxes would blare after the declaration of results on May 4. “The DJ will definitely play, and it will play so loudly that your ears will ring,” he had allegedly said. Two separate FIRs were lodged alleging the remark was provocative and could incite unrest.Questioning the investigation, TMC IT cell head Upasana Chowdhury said, “Before this ‘DJ’ remark, (Union home minister) Amit Shah had said during the election campaign that he would hang people upside down and set them right.
No action was taken. BJP neta Dilip Ghosh had also made controversial remarks. Why was no action taken then? This is an attempt to silence the opposition.”The CID visit at Aditi’s home comes days after police from Salboni police station conducted a late-night search operation in the area while looking for Abhishek’s close aide Sumit Roy in a land scam case. Officers had broken open a lock and entered the premises but failed to trace him.Earlier, asked about the remark, Abhishek had said, “When I made that statement, elections were already underway. At that time, the Election Commission was in charge of law and order. Then why was no FIR filed against me at that time? Now that the govt has changed, I will be tagged in several cases… The Union home minister had said Trinamool supporters would be hung upside down. EC took no action against him. If a case can be filed against me, then why not against the home minister? Why is the CID after my speech?”
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