KOLKATA: Just days before the first phase of the assembly polls in West Bengal, the Trinamool Congress' (TMC) political consultancy agency I-PAC, announced to suspend its operations in the state.
The I-PAC authorities made the announcement of closing down all operations in the state through emails sent to its employees on Saturday midnight. "In view of certain legal issues, management has decided to pause operations in West Bengal with immediate effect," the email stated.
"In this backdrop, all employees and team members are requested to avail a short leave for a period of 20 days. At the end of this period, by 11th May, we will regroup, review the situation and decide next steps," according to the email sent by the Human Resources wing of the I-PAC.
I-PAC's announcement came three months after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) conducted raids at multiple locations linked to the company, including the residence of its director Pratik Jain in Kolkata.
Meanwhil, the TMC has refuted reports that I-PAC has suspended operations in the state. The party, in a statement, said that the West Bengal unit of the I-PAC is fully engaged in its campaigning operations for the 2026 Assembly elections.
Elections to 152 constituencies in West Bengal will be held on April 23 and the remaining 142 seats will to polls on April 29. The counting of votes for all the 294 constituencies in the state will be on May 4.
Political observers said I-PAC’s reported decision to suspend operations in Bengal is significant, coming less than 80 hours before the first phase of polling.
They said the Trinamool Congress’s organisational structure has relied heavily on I-PAC’s field-level workers since 2019, when Abhishek Banerjee brought the poll strategist on board after the party’s poor performance in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
In the 2019 elections, the Trinamool won 22 Lok Sabha seats, while the BJP made major gains by securing 18 constituencies in the state.
Observers also said the Trinamool’s decision to deny tickets to 74 sitting MLAs for the upcoming Assembly elections was based largely on report cards prepared by I-PAC’s field workers across the state.
I-PAC has been facing legal troubles since January, following raids by the Enforcement Directorate at the residence of its director, Prateek Jain, and at the company’s Salt Lake office on January 8.
That day saw an unprecedented confrontation between Mamata Banerjee and the ED, which carried out raids at six premises linked to I-PAC. These included Jain’s residence on Loudon Street, the company’s office in Salt Lake Sector V, and four other locations in Delhi.
A dramatic scene unfolded when Mamata Banerjee arrived at Jain’s residence along with senior police officers, including former DGP Rajeev Kumar, while the raid was underway.
Banerjee accused ED officials of trying to seize hard disks and internal documents containing sensitive Trinamool organisational data. She described the raids as “politically motivated and unconstitutional”.
“They have raided the residence of our IT chief. They were confiscating my party’s documents and hard disks, which had details about our candidates for the Assembly polls. I have brought those back,” she had told reporters.
During a hearing in the I-PAC case on March 24, the Supreme Court asked Mamata Banerjee what her “legal reaction” would be if she came to power at the Centre in 2030 or 2031 and a Chief Minister from an opposing party disrupted a Central agency raid in a similar manner.
The observation was made by a Bench headed by Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra after Banerjee and the West Bengal government argued that the ED cannot move the Supreme Court directly under Article 32 of the Constitution, "crying" violation of its fundamental rights.
More recently, another I-PAC director, Vinesh Kumar Chandel, was arrested by the ED in Delhi on April 14 in connection with an alleged money laundering case. He was remanded to ED custody for 10 days.
The ED probe is based on an FIR filed by the Delhi Police. Investigation has allegedly unearthed multiple instances of financial irregularities and various modes of money laundering, including receipt of accounted and unaccounted funds, unsecured loans without any business credentials, issuance of bogus bills and invoices, receipt of funds from third parties, as well as movement of cash through ‘hawala’ channels with international links.