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CBI seeks records from 3 banks in cattle smuggling case; TMC leader grilled
CBI has asked the three banks to provide details of transactions made by TMC leader Anubrata Mondal and his relatives and associates who are suspects in the cattle smuggling case
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Wednesday asked three banks at Bolpur town in Bengal’s Birbhum district to provide details of transactions made by Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Anubrata Mondal and his relatives and associates who are suspects in the cattle smuggling case, officials of the federal agency said.
CBI has sent notices to the Punjab National Bank (PNB), State Bank of India (SBI) and Axis Bank, where Mondal, his daughter Sukanya and the other suspects have got accounts.
During the day, CBI grilled Kerim Khan, a district TMC leader, for more than seven hours at the agency’s Kolkata office. Khan, who is known to be a close associate of Mondal, was questioned on Tuesday as well at the agency’s camp office in Bolpur.
Sukanya Mondal, who was summoned to the camp office on Monday, skipped the interrogation and sent an email to CBI saying she was unwell and needed time to recover, said an official who did not want to be named.
On September 28, a large number of documents kept at the record room of the Bolpur branch of Axis Bank were destroyed in a fire that was suspected to have been caused by electrical short circuit.
CBI officers have visited the branch several times since July in connection with the cattle smuggling case in which Mondal, the TMC’s Birbhum district unit president, was arrested on August 11. He is currently in judicial custody and lodged in the Asansol correctional home in the adjacent West Burdwan district.
CBI officials said both Mondal and his daughter, who is the director of the two companies that are under scanner, have got accounts at the Axis bank.
The record room caught fire around the same time when Sukanya Mondal’s lawyer provided CBI with records of financial transactions of the two companies that the federal agency had asked for.
Sukanya Mondal, a primary school teacher, cited illness to skip interrogation on October 12 as well although the TMC leader’s nephew, Raja Ghosh, faced the investigating officers for four hours.
CBI claimed in its charge sheet against Anubrata Mondal last month that he is suspected to be linked to 168 land and property deeds executed in or after 2014. At least two dozen of these belong to Mondal, suspects the federal agency, while the remaining 144 registration papers bear the names of his relatives, aides and their kin.
CBI suspects that proceeds from cattle smuggling were used to buy these properties.
