Kolkata: Expelled youth Trinamool Congress leader Santanu Bandopadhyay, who was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) recently in connection with the multi-crore teachers recruitment scam in West Bengal, on Wednesday hinted in the count about evidence being planted at his residence leading to his arrest.
During the hearing on his bail plea at a special court of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), Bandopadhyay said that he was not that foolish as to preserve the list of 300 candidates on this count at his residence so that they can be used as evidences against him by the central agency sleuths.
He also dismissed charges against him by ED that he purchased and accumulated huge property from his ill-gotten scam proceeds. “I had enough. I used to own a mobile shop. So, such allegations are baseless,” claimed Bandopadhyay in the court.
However, in his counter argument the ED’s counsel Phiroze Edulji questioned how Bandopadhyay, as a lower-rung maintenance assistant with the state-run power distribution utility, could accumulate such huge wealth from a “paltry annual salary of Rs 6,00,000”.
“How could he accumulate a property to the tune of Rs 20 crore from his paltry annual income of just around Rs 6,00,000? Where he is now was inevitable. I would request the court to have a look at the case diary and it will be clear where the matter is heading for. Kindly go through the names of influential persons mentioned in the case diary. I am unable to pronounce those names in the open court,” Edulji said.
Finally, after hearing both sides, the judge of the special court rejected Bandopadhyaya’s bail plea and sent him to judicial custody till April 19.
–IANS
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