HC asks former CPI(M) minister to appear before Commission

The Calcutta High Court today said that the Justice (retd) Amitava Lala Commission of inquiry into the killing of 17 Anandamargis in 1982 was valid and directed former CPI-M minister Kanti Ganguly to appear before it.
While disposing of a petition by Ganguly, Justice Dipankar Dutta directed that the one-man Commission was free to ask Ganguly any question relating to the incident while the former minister would also have the right not to answer any of the questions.
It also directed that there would be no cross-examination of Ganguly on the basis of any question or its answer.
Ganguly had challenged the validity of the Commission and his summons to depose before it.

The Commission was set up by Mamata Banerjee government after it came to power on the ground that a Commission of Inquiry had been formed by the earlier Left Front government on the matter and that it had not yet submitted its report.
Mamata Banerjee government had set up the Justice (Retd) Amitava Lala Commission of Inquiry into the killing of 17 Anandamargis on a flyover in south Kolkata on April 30, 1982.