Concerned over the slow pace of investigation into the school jobs scam in West Bengal, the Calcutta High Court on Tuesday cautioned the Enforcement Directorate’s officers against adopting a “lax attitude” while probing the multi-tier recruitment scam
A single bench of Justice Amrita Sinha told Deputy Solicitor-General Dhiraj Trivedi, who was representing both the Enforcement Directorate and the Central Bureau of Investigation, that the Court was getting information that the investigating officers had become lax in their approach to the investigation and warned that they needed to be careful in their approach.
“I have been getting inputs that your officers are becoming lax. Please ask them to be careful. I know the names also. What is happening, how they are happening, I am getting to know. Your officers should remain extremely careful, because the entire investigation is court monitored. Like your submissions, I also get other reports from elsewhere. Genuine sources. Who has been interrogated, why they were interrogated, who was not questioned, I am getting all the information,” the Court remarked.
“Remember the agencies are conducting the probe under the monitoring of the Court,” the judge warned.
The ED counsel today presented a report under sealed cover detailing the list of assets that had been attached in connection with the recruitment scam. “While we have given the details of the assets attached amounting to Rs 148 crore, the market value of these assets is more than Rs 250 crore,” he submitted.
Referring to the attachment of assets made from Leaps and Bounds, a company linked to Trinamool Congress second-in-command and MP Abhishek Banerjee, who was its Chief Executive Officer and one of its directors for a limited period of time, Justice Sinha questioned the ED: “Why are the assets of the company and the directors of the company so low? From the report you are giving, it seems that this company has no source of income of its own. . The money is coming from somewhere else. Have you found out where that money came from?”
Dhiraj Trivedi, the lawyer of the ED and CBI, said that the CBI was probing this angle and added that attachments of Rs 13 crore had been made yesterday.
Justice Amrita Sinha also pulled up the West Bengal Government, for not filing their response to the submission made by the investigation agencies. Since the State respondents had not submitted their response, the Court adjourned the hearing to July 30.
On April 24, the Calcutta High Court bench of Justice Amrita Sinha had directed the Enforcement Directorate and the CBI to submit updated reports on their ongoing investigation into primary school jobs scam in West Bengal, focusing on the recruitment of primary teachers who passed a Teachers’ Eligibility Test (TET) in 2014.
The ED had also provided a forensic report on the voice sample of Sujay Krishna Bhadra, the Chief Operating Officer of Leaps and Bounds, a company reportedly linked to Trinamool Congress second-in-command and MP Abhishek Banerjee, who was its Chief Executive Officer and one of its directors for a limited period of time.
Justice Sinha had noted that the ED report only stated that the forensic report of Bhadra’s voice sample was in favour of the prosecution, without elaborating and had asked if the investigating agencies had found any money trail in the case.
The ED counsel submitted that “substantial progress” has been made in the investigation.
Deputy Solicitor-General Dhiraj Trivedi, representing the Central agencies that both the agencies were working in tandem and taking steps to conclude the investigation.
