Bengal school jobs scam: In the wake of the two consecutive recoveries of massive amounts of cash and gold from two of her residences in Kolkata’s Tollygunge and Belgharia, Arpita Mukherjee on Thursday confessed to the Enforcement Directorate (ED) that she was forced by West Bengal Minister Partha Chatterjee to allow her houses to be used to store the illegal cash. According to ED sources, Mukherjee also admitted that the cash recovered from her residences was parked there by Chatterjee with the help of one of his close associates unknown to her.
“She has confessed that Chatterjee used to come to both her Tollygunge and Belgharia residences once or even twice a week, and during his visits, he was accompanied by a person unknown to her. Mukherjee has also confessed that she did not even have access to the keys of the cupboards from where the cash recoveries were made. There were strict instructions from Chatterjee not to fiddle with the cupboards and also avoid frequenting the rooms where these cupboards were,” an ED official confirmed.
Meanwhile, the Trinamool Congress leadership is under immense pressure from within the party to relieve Partha Chatterjee of his ministerial and party posts with immediate effect. West Bengal’s industry minister Partha Chatterjee, arrested in the SSC scam, should be removed immediately from his post and expelled from the Trinamool Congress, the party’s state general secretary Kunal Ghosh demanded on Thursday.
TMC spokesperson Debangshu Bhattacharya, whose ‘Khela Hobe’ song headlined the party’s 2021 election campaign, also demanded that Chatterjee be expelled. “As a party worker, I feel that we don’t deserve this public humiliation because of one person. The leadership should take note of it and expel him from the party,” he said. Reacting to the statements, BJP spokesperson Samik Bhattacharya claimed that the TMC was trying to distance itself from Chatterjee.
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The comment came amid the opposition BJP and CPI(M)’s attack on the TMC for not taking any action against Chatterjee even as huge amounts of cash were recovered from properties linked to him. On Wednesday, Ghosh said that hoped the TMC leadership would take note of the public perception as the recovery of cash brought “disgrace” to the party and “shame to all of us”.
Nearly Rs 50 crore in cash, and gold believed to be in kilograms were recovered from apartments linked to Chatterjee’s close associate Arpita Mukherjee, besides documents of properties and foreign exchange, as per officials of the Enforcement Directorate, which arrested them.
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