New Delhi: Supreme Court on Thursday (January 15) stayed the West Bengal Police from taking action against Enforcement Directorate (ED) officers in a matter arising from a recent spat between the state government and the central investigative agency. The court said it is “very much disturbed” by a recent situation that arose in the Calcutta high court during a hearing related to the same face-off between the ED and the state government.The court noted that it is a “serious issue” and that it intends to issue notice in the matter, the Hindustan Times reported.The state police filed FIRs against the ED officers last week, after chief minister Mamata Banerjee interrupted its raid on the Kolkata premises of political consultancy I-PAC on January 8. In response, the ED approached the Supreme Court under Article 32 of the constitution. The Article allows citizens to approach the top court to enforce or restore certain fundamental rights.A bench comprising Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra and Justice Vipul Pancholi issued notices to the state government on the ED plea, LiveLaw reported Thursday. It said the state government can respond to the application filed by the ED in two weeks, declining its request for additional time.“Normally, your lordships don’t stay investigation. No coercive steps direction is another option,” Senior Advocate A.M. Singhvi, representing the state police, said during the hearing.“This is mobocracy,” Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said in court, according to NDTV, describing the events in Calcutta high court on January 9 when lawyers disrupted the proceedings, leading to an adjournment. The ED had petitioned the Calcutta high court, but on the day of the hearing, he alleged, the “legal cell of TMC sent message to its members on whatsapp calling them to assemble in the court.”While seeking a stay on the FIRs, which would mean that the police would not conduct an investigation or make arrests against the agency’s officers until the court ruled otherwise, Mehta told the court, “We are praying for stay of FIRs against us…they [state police] are constantly filing new FIRs.”On the other hand, the chief minister and state government (police) argued through their lawyers, senior advocate Kapil Sibal and Singhvi, respectively, that the raids on I-PAC were an attempt to secure information related to the political activities of the chief minister’s Trinamool Congress (TMC) party. They pointed out that I-PAC handles certain election-related activities for the TMC.LiveLaw reported that Sibal told the court there was nothing available in I-PAC offices except some election related documents, with which the ED “has no concern”, and therefore it should not have entered the premises. It was also argued on behalf of the state government that local police was not informed by the ED before searching I-PAC.Referring to Mehta’s statement that the authorities were informed, Singhvi contended that the state government received only a “casual email at around 11:30 am, even though the search had begun at 6:45 am”, according to The Tmes of India.The ED sought to resume its search of I-PAC premises and the court’s intervention to prohibit Banerjee from intervening in the process. It claimed that the case of money laundering due to which I-PAC and its founder Pratik Jain’s premises were raided was filed in 2020, and was not a new matter. Accordingly, it sought an order to preserve the CCTV footage of the incident on January 9, which the court accepted.LiveLaw reported the Supreme Court observations during the hearing as follows:According to us, larger questions are involved and have been raised, which if allowed to remain undecided, would further worsen the situation and there will be a situation of lawlessness prevailing in one or the other state, considering that different [political] outfits are governing at different places. True it is that any central agency has no power to interfere with election work of any party, but at the same time, if central agencies are acting bona fide to investigate any serious offense, question arises as to whether taking shield of party activity agencies can be restricted from carrying out power?Additional Solicitor General S.V. Raju, appearing on behalf of the ED, said, “No prosecution shall lie against a government officer discharging [their] duty in good faith… The search proceedings [at I-PAC premises in Kolkata] were under good faith. This [the FIRs] are to put pressure on us. I have prayed for stay….” He also referred to Banerjee entering the premises, and allegedly taking away material while the raid was ongoing.Mehta referred to the incident on January 8 as “theft” by the chief minister.The bench noted that since the [ED officers] had authorisation letters to conduct the raid, they were “acting in good faith”.Sibal and Singhvi argued that the there is a “pattern of investigation at time of elections”, and that the dispute between the ED and the state government officials was before the Calcutta high court, and so the Supreme Court need not entertain the present round of pleas.“Singhvi argued that a direct approach to the Supreme Court by the ED was permissible only in exceptional situations where no effective remedy was available,” The Times of India reported.“Nothing material was recovered during the search [of I-PAC],” Sibal said in court. He said that the chief minister had not gone to the premises where the raid was conducted in her capacity as a chief minister but as the TMC chief. “She had gone there on information that certain unauthorised persons had entered into premises of [Pratik] Jain, who had been entrusted with the party’s election work,” he said.Singhvi also said that the chief minister has Z+ security, which is why the state Director General of Police had accompanied her to the I-PAC premises on January 8.The court, after hearing all the sides, decided to issue notice and asked the state government to file a counter affidavit in two weeks. “In the meanwhile, it is directed that the respondents shall preserve CCTV cameras and other storage devices containing the footage of both the premises searched [on January 8]. It is also directed that other proceedings and investigation relating to [ED officers] shall remain stayed till next date.”