Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) West Bengal president Sukanta Majumdar on Tuesday launched a scathing attack at chief minister Mamata Banerjee, alleging that her party, Trinamool Congress, has been ‘lying from the very beginning’ about Partha Chatterjee and Arpita Mukherjee's involvement in the ongoing investigation in the teacher recruitment scam.
Majumdar went on to say that Banerjee used to be a part of the political campaign of the two arrested in the School Service Commission (SSC) scam. “TMC has been lying from the very beginning, Arpita Mukherjee is a political personality she used to be part of the political campaign of Partha Chatterjee and other programmes of TMC. They are trying to deny the charges,” he said, as quoted by news agency ANI.
Trunks full of cash was recovered by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) from Partha Chatterjee's house, as well as that of Arpita Mukherjee, who claimed the money belonged to the minister.
Partha Chatterjee, who was arrested by the ED on July 23, was West Bengal's education minister when the SSC scam was allegedly pulled off. Actor Arpita Mukherjee, an aide of the 69-year-old politician, was also arrested by the ED after it found crores of rupees from her residences in various parts of the city.
Taking a dig at Banerjee's decision to reshuffle cabinet, the Bengal BJP president alleged that she was trying to divert the media's attention from the corruption cases in West Bengal.
{{/usCountry}}Taking a dig at Banerjee's decision to reshuffle cabinet, the Bengal BJP president alleged that she was trying to divert the media's attention from the corruption cases in West Bengal.
{{/usCountry}}“Due to the corruption cases that are coming to the fore in West Bengal, the people of Bengal have understood that the entire government is a thief. The thief will go and another new thief will come and he will start stealing again with his new energy, nothing much is going to change,” Majumdar told ANI.
“If Banerjee had taken the right decision in this matter, then there would be a loss for the BJP in the coming elections, but it will not be a total political loss,” he said.
Banerjee carried out a major cabinet reshuffle on Monday and inducted several new faces, including some ministers with thrust on toning up the party ahead of next year’s crucial panchayat polls.
After Banerjee's announcement Asima Patra, the minister of state with independent charge of the department of planning, statistics and programme monitoring and Saumen Mahapatra, the state irrigation and waterways minister were assigned organisational responsibilities in their respective districts.