Bengal’s Minister, Partha Chatterjee Taken Under After 20 Hours of ED Quizzing
Source- Bengal SSC scam case LIVE Updates: Partha Chatterjee’s close aide Arpita, who had Rs 20 crore in cash at home, arrested – India Today; Partha Chatterjee recent – Bing images
Partha Chatterjee and his “close associate”, Arpita Mukherjee, were interrogated for a continuous 20 hours by the Enforcement Directorate, on and from Friday. Later on, Saturday at 2:10 am they were arrested.
The TMC secretary general and Bengal Cabinet minister, Partha Chatterjee and Arpita Mukherjee have been arrested after the prolonged inquiry and recovery of an amount of Rs. 21.9 crores from Arpita’s apartment in south Kolkata.
The Trinamool Congress held a press conference on Saturday at 6:30 pm at its headquarters in Kolkata, addressed by Firhad Hakim, Aroop Biswas, and Kunal Ghosh.
The ED informed it was a job-for-cash scam in the school education department that was headed by Partha Chatterjee.
The twin arrest recovered, gold worth Rs. 74 lakhs, Rs. 54 lakhs in foreign currency and property deeds of eight apartments.
Mr. Chatterjee told the reporters while being escorted from his home at Naktala, that he tried calling CM Mamata Banerjee, but couldn’t get in touch. Later he was taken to ESI Hospital at Joka for a medical test and then produced to Bank shall Court, which imprisoned him under ED custody for two days.
While Chatterjee was shifted to SSKM Hospital in the evening, his “close associate”, Ms. Mukherjee was taken under custody.
Arpita, in her interrogation, confessed, that the cash was collected by agents from job aspirants and was to be distributed among many senior bureaucrats and politicians.
The RBI sent more than 20 trucks to ferry the seized cash. It has been informed, that the envelopes were marked as, “On India Government Service” and “Minister in Charge”.
Arpita said while being escorted, “I am innocent. It is a conspiracy hatched by BJP”.
ED detained Chatterjee’s personal secretary, Sukanta Acharjee who was also a member of the advisory panel in 2019 and was responsible for the recruitment of teachers to state-run schools.
An assistant professor from Nazrul Islam University is also taken under the scanner. ED informed Arpita owns a home in Santiniketan and 10 apartments.
Trinamool said that they won’t have full faith in the judiciary findings and allegations made by ED, as their neutrality is questionable.
Kunal Ghosh, TMC spokesperson said that the statements made by ED have said the cash was seized from a lady’s home.
TMC neither had any connection with her, nor any links with the money found. He said the party will wait for judicial statements and if found guilty, will take necessary steps.
He added, “We often see that the cases by central agencies turn out to be long-drawn. We want the probe to be completed quickly.”
Miniter’s counsel. Debashis Roy said, the ED arrested Chatterjee after recovering the property-related documents.
He mentioned that this isn’t enough to arrest him, the ED is trying to achieve a political goal, moving a bail plea.
ED claimed, that granting Mr. Partha Chatterjee bail, will lead to the destruction of evidence and hinder the trace of the money trail. The court declared the prosecution to move special MP/MLA’s court on Monday.
Assembly speaker, Biman Banerjee said, he wasn’t informed about the arrest as the constitutional procedure.
Kolkata mayor, Firhad Hakim said that he had to go to jail in a case while being in Trinamool Congress, while Suvendu Adhikary being associated in the same case was not at all questioned, as he was in BJP.
He quoted, “BJP te gele sadhu, TMC e thakle chor (if you are a saint, but in TMC you are a thief).”
Union Sports Minister, Anurag Thakur said that West Bengal’s CM, Mamata Banerjee broke all records of corruption.
Partha Chatterjee has been charged under the PMLA Act and the hearing is underway in court.
