Calcutta High Court on Monday handed over probe into the March 13 murder of Jhalda’s Congress councillor Tapan Kandu to the CBI.

The state government had appointed a special investigating team to probe the murder but Tapan’s wife Purnima had moved court seeking a CBI investigation.

Justice Rajasekhar Mantha of the high court directed the SIT to hand over all case-related documents to the CBI with immediate effect.

“It is a fact that the police have failed to progress in its investigation into the case. After verifying the case diary and other related documents of the case, it has been revealed that some procedures like taking photographs after the incident, interrogation of Jhalda IC Sanjib Ghosh were not done by the investigators. The mobile phone of the IC, who was made one of the accused by the petitioner party, has not been seized yet,” Justice Mantha said.

The court directed the CBI to summit its progress report of the probe before the court after 45 days.

The state government is yet to decide if it would challenge this order before a larger bench.

After the order, Purnima said she now hoped for justice.

She said she was shattered after Purulia police chief S. Selvamurugan claimed her husband’s murder was apolitical and fallout of a family feud between Tapan and his cousin Naren and nephew Dipak.

“He was trying to hide facts to protect my husband's killers at the behest of Trinamul. He even gave a clean chit to the Jharda IC who had threatened my husband to join the Trinamul or else get framed in false cases,” she said.

A HC division bench headed by Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava on Monday hoped that police would conduct a fair inquiry into the Matia rape case in which a nine-year-old girl was sexually brutalised. Her kin moved court seeking a CBI probe. After going through the case diary and progress report, the court held that it would not be wise to disturb the investigators at this stage.