Arrested TMC leader Partha claims CPI(M), BJP leaders sought favours

Senior Trinamool Congress leader Partha Chatterjee, who is in CBI custody in connection with the alleged illegal recruitment in government and aided schools in West Bengal, on Thursday slammed opposition parties for questioning his credentials and claimed that they had recommended to him candidates for employment.

Chatterjee also asserted that he had declined their request.

The opposition BJP and CPI(M) dubbed his claim a desperate attempt to divert the attention of the people.

“Those who are lecturing me today should first check their own credentials," Chatterjee, a former education minister, said.

“Sujan Chakraborty of the (CP-M), Suvendu Adhikari and Dilip Ghosh (both BJP) came to me and recommended a few names. But I declined. I told them I could not keep such unethical requests," he claimed while talking to reporters when entering Alipore court where he was produced during the day.

Chatterjee was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for his alleged involvement in the School Service Commission (SSC) scam in July last year. He is now in CBI custody in the same case.

"I was not in charge of recruitment. Please go through the records of 2012... Those who are themselves tainted are trying to malign me,” he said.

Nearly half an hour before Chatterjee's remarks, TMC spokesperson Kunal Ghosh in a tweet wondered whether the two opposition parties' leaders had sought favours from him and that the central agencies must probe this angle.

After his remark, Ghosh said, “When the former education minister is taking names, then the probe agency must look into it.”

Chatterjee was the education minister when the alleged irregularities took place.

Both BJP and the CPI (M) dubbed the allegations as “baseless”.

“I was not even in politics in 2012. I joined politics only in 2014. Maybe after spending so many months in prison, Partha Chatterjee has lost his mental balance and is trying to pin the blame on others,” Ghosh, who is the BJP national vice-president, said.

CPI(M) central committee member Sujan Chakraborty, “The allegations are baseless and are a desperate attempt to malign others. Why did he not reveal this information for so long? This proves that the TMC is now using tricks to divert attention from the real issue. Let them prove their allegations,” he added.

Talking to reporters later, Adhikari said the people of West Bengal are fed up with the “old scripts” to malign opposition parties.

“Let them prove the allegations against me. I am not bothered about what a jailed minister is saying about me. The people of the state very well understand such theatrics by the ruling camp. There is a sense of fear and anxiety that has gripped the TMC and now they just want to blame others,” he said.

After Chatterjee’s arrest by the ED, West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee relieved him of his duties as minister in charge of several heavyweight portfolios including commerce and industry. He was also removed from all party posts and suspended from the Trinamool Congress.