'Centre showing dictatorial attitude', says Sougata Roy as LS passes bills for extending tenure of ED, CBI chiefs

Trinamool Congress's Rajya Sabha MP Sougata Roy slammed the Centre over extending the tenure of Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) Chiefs and said that it is showing "dictatorial attitude".

Roy opposed the two Ordinances, namely, Central Vigilance Commission (Amendment) Bill, 2021 and The Delhi Special Police Establishment (Amendment) Bill, 2021.

While speaking to ANI, Roy said, "The government is showing dictatorial attitude. They earlier bought ordinances to amend the Central Vigilance Commission Bill, Delhi Special Police Establishment (Amendment) Bill, 2021 by raising the tenure from two to five years. This was vigorously opposed by us in parliament."

"This will give advantage to certain favourite officers by the government. The consequences will be similar to dangling a carrot to the concerned officers that if they act according to the government, they will have the possibility to get extensions. This will take away the neutrality," Roy added.

The government has amended Section 25 of the Central Vigilance Commission Bill and Section 4B of The Delhi Special Police Establishment Bill.

The Central Vigilance Commission Bill and the Delhi Special Police Establishment Bill governs the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) respectively. This amendment will extend the maximum tenure of CBI and ED directors for up to to five years.

"...CBI and ED have both been accused of catering to the political interest of the ruling party. Not one Opposition party has been left out of their grip - Congress, Trinamool Congress (TMC), Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), Shiv Sena, National Conference, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). Cases have been lodged against all of them. The moment somebody joins BJP, all his cases are forgotten," Roy stated in Parliament while raising the issue.

Opposition parties in Lok Sabha on Thursday slammed the government over the bills to extend the tenures of Directors of CBI and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) up to a maximum of five years saying that the extensions will be given at the "whims and fancies of the political executive" and will undermine the autonomy of the two institutions.

The Central Vigilance Commission (Amendment) Bill, 2021, and the Delhi Special Police Establishment (Amendment) Bill, 2021 were passed with a voice vote by the House after a reply by the Minister of State of Department of Personnel and Training Jitendra Singh.

Moving the bills for passage in the House, the minister said that if an official or chief of a probe agency is investigating a case, it requires "a certain amount of continuity besides institutional continuity".

( With inputs from ANI )

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor