The Supreme Court on Monday declined to grant interim permission to Trinamool Congress MP Abhishek Banerjee to travel abroad and directed the Calcutta High Court to decide his pending application seeking permission within one week.
Mentioning the matter before the Bench, Senior Advocate Gopal Shankaranayan submitted that the application was innocuous and sought only a limited modification of the High Court’s order to enable Banerjee to travel overseas for medical purposes. He pointed out that courts had granted similar liberty even in more serious cases.
The Solicitor General Tushar Mehta assisted by Nishant Awana, Standing Counsel, appeared for the State of West Bengal. informed the Court that the application was already part of the High Court’s consolidated monthly list and that the High Court could be requested to take it up on an earlier date. Recording that the application remained pending and that no hearing date had been fixed, the Supreme Court observed:
“Application for allowing to travel abroad for medical treatment is pending before the High Court. It appears that no date has been fixed so far. We therefore request the High Court to look into that application.”
The Court accordingly disposed of the mentioning by requesting the Calcutta High Court to consider the pending application within a week.