Kolkata: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday once again raided the Tollygunge flat of Arpita Mukherjee where nearly Rs 22 crore cash was recovered, along with jewellery worth lakhs and property deeds.
The ED sources also revealed that several student leaders are also under the scanner of the central agency in connection with the multi-crore recruitment scam.
“Along with the student leaders, the relatives and other close aides of both Arpita and arrested former TMC minister Partha Chatterjee are also under scanner. The ED has also frozen eight accounts of Arpita,” said the ED sources.
The ED sources also mentioned that Arpita and Chatterjee knew each other much before the latter became the state education minister in 2014.
“The farm house in Shantiniketan named ‘APA’ was bought from a Kolkata-based Bengali family at a price of 20 lakh rupees in 2012 under the name of Arpita and Chatterjee. After the construction of the mansion, the mutation was done in 2020 under Arpita’s name,” said the ED sources, also adding that the details of more properties of the duo will be revealed soon.
The ED sources also mentioned that on Friday night Arpita again broke down while being interrogated while Chatterjee was ‘firm’ and avoided most of the questions of the agency.
Pranab Bhattacharya, Arpita's driver also said that in the recent past she along with her mother, sister and brother-in-law Kalyan Dhar visited the farmhouse.
“I got the job as the driver of Arpita Mukherjee through Partha Chatterjee. She had several luxurious cars. Chatterjee seldom used to visit the flat in Tollygunge to meet Arpita and sometimes Arpita used to visit Chatterjee’s residence. Initially, I had no hint but later it was clear that Arpita was a close aide of Chatterjee. But I had no idea about the multi-crore scam as I have not heard of any monetary dealings from them,” said the driver Pranab Bhattacharya.
Incidentally, Kalyan Dhar was also a driver of Arpita and is also a director of the company Ichhe Entertainment.
However, Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) Mayor Firhad Hakim, who is also the chairman of Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority KMDA) said that he has asked the KMDA officials to serve a notice at the building of Ichhe Entertainment stating that the building at Rajdanga in South 24 Parganas belongs to KMDA.
Meanwhile, state BJP president Sukanta Majumdar was arrested by police though was released later for demanding ‘resignation’ of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee with a poster near her residence at Kalighat in South Kolkata.
The Congress also staged a protest in Kolkata over the same demand.
CPI (M) leader and lawyer Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya said that the entire TMC is ‘corrupted’.
