Opinion: Mamata Banerjee Will Find It Hard To Defend L'affaire Mahua Moitra

On Vijayadashami day, as West Bengal's annual religio-cultural Durga Puja festivities wound down, Cyclone 'Hamoon' threatened the coastal areas of the state. For the government of Mamata Banerjee and her Trinamool Congress (TMC), this annual threat of nature added to a storm raging for the past fortnight over l'affaire Mahua Moitra, the party's MP from Krishnagar.

Trinamool, which is quick to play victim and allege the misuse of agencies by the Centre when scams related to the state are probed, maintained a deafening silence as charges were traded on what has come to be known as the "cash-for-query" scam. (West Bengal is among the states that have withdrawn general consent to the CBI to probe cases - all CBI probes and most Enforcement Directorate probes in the state are being conducted under the directions of the Calcutta High Court, which is using these agencies as its arm).

The silence was broken four days back, not voluntarily but necessitated by media queries. Trinamool Congress spokesperson Kunal Ghosh appeared to smirk as he told television cameras, "Trinamool Congress has nothing to say on the Mahua Moitra issue. The party will not give any reaction to it."

Ghosh hinted that it was for Mahua Moitra to offer clarifications. Ghosh speaks only at the instance of his boss Mamata Banerjee. His denial had the intrinsic hazard of affirmation.

Two days after Ghosh chose to wink at l'affaire Mahua Moitra, the party's Rajya Sabha leader, Derek O'Brien, clarified that the Trinamool would take an "appropriate decision" after relevant parliamentary forums examined the matter.

This was not the last from the Trinamool brass. A day after O'Brien's categorical assertion, West Bengal Minister Firhad Hakim, who is also Mayor of Kolkata, seemed to go soft on Moitra and endorsed her stand that the allegations were aimed at 'silencing' her in parliament. Hakim was quick to add that he was expressing his "personal view, not the views of the party".

Sudip Bandyopadhyay, Trinamool's leader in Lok Sabha, preferred silence on the MP who belongs to this House. West Bengal BJP leaders were quick to seize on the mismatch and allege that the Trinamool is divided on the subject.

Interestingly, during the Durga Puja festivities, while Mamata Banerjee and her party were silent on Moitra, top BJP leaders who visited Kolkata - Amit Shah, JP Nadda, Dharmendra Pradhan, Tejaswi Surya - too avoided raising the topic. Their focus was different. Durga Puja pandals are famed for their unique themes. The Subodh Mullick Square Puja pandal, organised by a BJP councillor, was built like a replica of the Ram temple coming up in Ayodhya. It drew the maximum crowds this year.

The stoic silence of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who perhaps fancies holding the copyright on "exposing the Modi-Adani nexus", is also worth noting. Sanjay Raut of Shiv Sena (UBT), Tejaswi Yadav of (RJD) apart, no member of the opposition INDIA alliance has come to Mahua Moitra's defence.

The exposé by lawyer Jai Anant Dehadrai (referred to as jilted ex by Moitra), its escalation by Nishikant Dubey and the affirmation of their charges by businessman Darshan Hiranandani in an affidavit to the Consul General of India in Dubai (where he is resident) seem to have stunned the political class into silence.

The Trinamool is battling a number of scams. Alleged corruption in the recruitment of teachers; selections in municipal jobs; coal and cattle smuggling (to Bangladesh) are weighing heavily on the party. Apparently, it does not want to add to the list l'affaire Mahua Moitra.

The Ethics Committee, a 15-member body with seven BJP and eight opposition members, will now take up Nishikant Dubey's complaint. By month-end, the Delhi High Court will resume hearing the defamation suit filed by Moitra against Dubey, the whistleblower-lawyer Dehadrai, and against media entities that have reported the story. The initial hearing had to be aborted as Moitra's lawyer had to withdraw from the case over issues related to ethics.

L'affaire Moitra is unprecedented in India's parliamentary history. The cash-for-query scam of 2005, which led to the expulsion of 10 Lok Sabha MPs and the resignation of a Rajya Sabha member, was exposed through a sting operation by the media. The Dehadrai allegations, which suggest that an MP's parliamentary password was compromised, enabling a businessman to directly frame and submit questions on the Lok Sabha portal, merit a thorough probe.

Moitra has countered that many more MPs share their passwords with unauthorised persons. Dehadrai's sworn affidavit clearly pinpoints the arrow of suspicion. If more such examples are identified, the Ethics Committee and appropriate probe bodies could unearth more worms.

West Bengal, the state Mahua Moitra represents, has sent legendary women parliamentarians in the past-Renu Chakraborty and Geeta Mukherjee, both belonging to the now-defunct CPI, were among them. As the new Parliament House began its journey with legislation enabling reservation for women, MPs across the political divide recalled the pioneering role of Geeta Mukherjee.

Thanks to Mamata Banerjee's dominance of Bengal politics, the state sent 14 women to Lok Sabha in 2014 out of its 42 seats - that came to 33 per cent, even without reservation. In 2019, the number dropped to 11, but was still above the average representation for women from other states.

The names of martyrs Pritilata Waddedar, an associate of Surya Sen of the Chittagong armoury raid fame, and her comrade Kalpana Dutt, along with Matangini Hazra - who did not let the tricolour fall to the ground even as she was shot dead - are the ideals for women in West Bengal. So are Sarojini Naidu (née Chattopadhyaya) and Aruna Asaf Ali (née Ganguly), whose roles in the freedom movement are remembered. Against this backdrop, Moitra's Louis Vuitton persona will perhaps be a tad difficult for the Trinamool to explain in the days to come.

(Shubhabrata Bhattacharya is a retired Editor and a public affairs commentator.)

Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author.