Kolkata: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday released an audio clip claiming that Trinamool Congress youth wing president and chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee received ₹900 crore from corruption.
BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari, who contested against the CM on the East Midnapore district’s Nandigram assembly seat on April 1, released the audio clip at a press conference and claimed that Abhishek Banerjee received ₹900 crore from rackets that smuggled cow, coal and sand.
The purported audio clip, he said, allegedly contains conversation that took place between Kolkata-based businessman Ganesh Bagaria and the absconding general secretary of the youth wing of the TMC, Vinay Mishra, both of whom are suspects in the coal smuggling scam that the CBI and ED are probing.
In the audio clip, the veracity of which was not independently verified by HT, one man could be heard telling the other that money from the coal scam went to Abhishek Banerjee.
The BJP released the clip a few hours after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested Ashok Mishra, an inspector of the West Bengal police who was posted in Bankura district in the coal pilferage case. “He has more evidence, which will be released later,” said Adhikari.
{{/usCountry}}The BJP released the clip a few hours after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested Ashok Mishra, an inspector of the West Bengal police who was posted in Bankura district in the coal pilferage case. “He has more evidence, which will be released later,” said Adhikari.
{{/usCountry}}Dismissing the fresh allegations made on Sunday, Bengal’s deputy parliamentary affairs minister Tapas Roy said, “Why is the BJP making these allegations in the middle of the elections? They brought similar charges in the past as well. It had no effect. This, too, will prove to be a futile attempt.”
The CBI and ED officials did not comment on the audio clip on Sunday.
In February, the CBI questioned Abhishek Banerjee’s wife Rujira Naroola and her sister Maneka Gambhir, the latter’s husband Ankush Arora and his father Pawan Arora in the coal smuggling case.