Abhishek quizzed in March, ED now summons 8 IPS officers in Bengal coal scam

The IPS officers are from West Bengal, and they could be questioned between August 21 and August 31, news agency ANI reported.

Updated on: Aug 11, 2022, 16:00:36 IST

By HT News Desk, New Delhi

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The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has reportedly issued summons to eight IPS officers, including Gyanwant Singh, Koteswara Rao, S Selvamurugan, Shyam Singh, Rajeev Mishra, Sukesh Kumar Jain, and Tathagata Basu, in connection with the West Bengal coal scam case. The probe agency asked the officers to join its investigation in New Delhi.

It was the CBI which had started the probe into the coal smuggling case, while the ED initiated a parallel investigation. (Shutterstock)

News agency PTI reported that the IPS officers have been given specific dates to appear before the ED. The IPS officers are from West Bengal, and they could be questioned between August 21 and August 31, news agency ANI reported.

"These IPS officers played crucial roles in the coal smuggling case. There is evidence that these officers benefited from the scam. All of them were posted in areas where the smuggling happened," PTI quoted an ED official as saying.

Of the eight officers, seven were summoned by the agency in 2021 too.

ANI, citing sources, reported that a few police officials were also involved in the transportation of cash in official vehicles.

What is the West Bengal coal scam case?

>Trinamool Congress youth leader Vinay Mishra is a prime accused in the case. Local coal operator Anup Majhi is also a prime suspect in the case.

>He is allegedly a close associate of chief minister Mamta Banerjee's nephew Abhishek Banerjee, who was also questioned by the ED in March.

>It was the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) which had started the probe into the coal smuggling case, while the ED initiated a parallel investigation.

>In November 2020, the CBI registered a case and alleged that illegally mined coal, worth several thousand crores of rupees, has been sold in the black market over several years by a racket operating in the western parts of West Bengal where the Eastern Coalfields Limited runs several mines.

>On February 21, 2021, a CBI team visited Abhishek's house and summoned his wife Rujira and his sister-in-law Menaka Gambhir over an alleged connection in the case.

>The ED lodged a case under the provisions of the PMLA based on a November 2020 FIR registered by the CBI that alleged a multi-crore coal pilferage scam related to Eastern Coalfields Limited mines in the state's Kunustoria and Kajora areas in and around Asansol.

>The ED had claimed that the parliamentarian was a beneficiary of funds obtained from this illegal trade. It has arrested two people in this case till now.

(With inputs from PTI, ANI)

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