Trinamul Congress candidate Mahua Moitra on Sunday appealed to the Election Commission to frame “guidelines” or a “framework” for operations by central investigating agencies like the CBI while the model code of conduct was in place.

In a letter to the commission, the expelled MP also urged it to issue a directive so that the agencies did not take coercive steps against a candidate or “politically exposed person” during the election process.

Her letter was sent after the CBI on Saturday raided premises linked to her — one in Calcutta and three in Nadia.

The letter says the “illegal” raids were carried out to please the agency’s “political masters” and had the “sole intention of hindering the campaign process” and creating a “negative perception” about her ahead of the general election.

Mahua is Trinamul candidate from Krishnanagar, the seat she represented before her expulsion from the Lok Sabha last December, on the recommendations of the House ethics committee, for “unethical” conduct.

She had been accused by a BJP member of asking questions in the Lok Sabha, apparently to attack industrialist Gautam Adani and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in exchange for cash and gifts from a businessman. Mahua has challenged her expulsion before the Supreme Court.

However, the CBI on March 21 registered an FIR against her following a directive from the Lokpal.

In her letter to the poll panel, which includes 10 annexed pages relating to the details of the searches, Mahua says: “This is not surprising that such illegal measures (raids) have been undertaken by the CBI to please their political masters at the Centre.”

Mahua adds: “There is no doubt that the CBI was unequivocally aware that their action was targeted to throttle my election campaign efforts and to thereby illegally harass me.”

Mahua has alleged that although the CBI left “empty-handed”, the raids generated a furore in the media, creating “doubt and contempt” about her among the people and thereby unjustly helping her political opponents at her cost.

In her appeal, which she has shared on X, Mahua has urged the commission to ensure a level playing field for all political parties by taking proactive measures as it has in the past.

“For this purpose, a central investigating agency which is under the control of the ruling dispensation at the centre, must be appropriately saddled to ensure that in the name of investigation, they are not carrying out political biddings which favour the party in power at the centre,” her letter says.

“There is an urgent need to ensure appropriate guidelines and create a framework to ensure that the festival of democracy is not a mere farce, but a genuine process to voice the wishes of the electorate.”

The Lokpal, which directed the filing of the FIR based on the CBI’s preliminary findings, has asked the agency to submit its investigation report within six months.