The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed a plea filed by the Mamata Banerjee-led faction of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) seeking permission to operate four bank accounts that have been debit-frozen.

A bench of Justices MM Sundresh and PB Varale declined to interfere with the Calcutta High Court’s order refusing to grant interim relief to the faction.

The Supreme Court observed that the Election Commission has frozen the party’s election symbol, while the larger dispute over which faction is entitled to the funds remains pending adjudication.

“We refrain from going into the merits. We are not inclined to exercise our jurisdiction under Article 136. We request the High Court to expedite the hearing,” the bench said.

On August 27, the Calcutta High Court had refused to pass an interim order allowing the Mamata Banerjee-led faction to operate four debit-frozen bank accounts containing around Rs 804 crore. The High Court had observed that granting such relief could undermine its earlier order permitting the political party to meet its day-to-day expenses.

The TMC faction had approached the court seeking permission to operate the four accounts maintained with public sector banks. It argued that there were legal shortcomings in the FIRs on the basis of which the accounts were frozen by the West Bengal Police.