Teachers' scam: Arrested Youth Trinamool leader names Partha Chatterjee as proceeds recipient

Kolkata, Jan 26

Youth Trinamool Congress leader Kunal Ghosh, who was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) sleuths in connection with the multi-crore teachers' recruitment irregularity scam in West Bengal, has reportedly named former state Education Minister Partha Chatterjee as the principal recipient of the scandal's proceeds.

Ghosh made the revelation while being interrogated by ED sleuths.

On Wednesday, he had made a significant statement to mediapersons that he is confident that someday the principal masterminds of the scam will be behind the bars.

"The corruption is sky-high. Let there be a proper investigation and everything will be revealed. The names of the masterminds in the matter will surface. It will be revealed who is guilty and who is not. There has been a grand conspiracy in the matter. Rather this is the biggest conspiracy in recent times."

Sources said that later in the day, he broke down during interrogations and besides confessing his involvement in accepting money for arranging illegal recruitments, he also informed that a major portion of the proceeds collected by him was passed on to Chatterjee.

They said that as per Ghosh's confession, he collected around Rs 19 crore, out of which he passed on around Rs 15 crore to the former minister.

He had also named one Gopal Dalpati as a witness to his handing over the amount to Chatterjee.

The sources further said that this confession by Ghosh becomes yet another strong point of argument of the central agency counsel to plead for extension of Chatterjee's judicial custody.

Ghosh was arrested by the central agency sleuths on January 21 after a marathon raid and search operations for about 24 hours that started the previous day.

During the course of search operations, ED sources recovered some crucial documents relating to the scam-related transactions.

Before his arrest, Ghosh was also questioned twice by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which is conducting a parallel probe in the recruitment scam.

He was questioned following a statement given to the CBI by Tapas Mondal, president of All Bengal Teachers' Training Achievers' Association (ABTTAA), an umbrella organisation of the private teachers' training institutes in West Bengal, that Ghosh received a massive amount of Rs 19 crore in various phases relating to the scam.