The office of a stockbroker suspected of giving ₹49 lakh to three Congress legislators from Jharkhand arrested by West Bengal police on July 31 was raided by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) on Tuesday.
The stockbroker was identified as Mahendra Agarwal, a CID officer said on condition of anonymity. Police had to break into the office. Agarwal could not be traced till Tuesday evening.
“We suspect that the sum of ₹49 lakh was part of a big consignment that was promised to the MLAs when they flew to Guwahati from Kolkata on July 29 and returned the next day,” the CID official said, adding that the MLAs made contradictory statements during interrogation.
Investigators are probing whether Agarwal received ₹49 lakh through the informal hawala channel so that he could hand over the cash to Jamtara legislator Irfan Ansari, Khijri MLA Rajesh Kachhap and Naman Bixal, the Kolebira MLA.
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A sum of ₹3.5 lakh in cash and some silver coins were seized from Agarwal’s office, which has been locked since July 30, when the MLAs were detained by Howrah district police in the Panchla area during a security check.
{{/usCountry}}A sum of ₹3.5 lakh in cash and some silver coins were seized from Agarwal’s office, which has been locked since July 30, when the MLAs were detained by Howrah district police in the Panchla area during a security check.
{{/usCountry}}The MLAs were travelling in Ansari’s SUV. His assistant and the driver were arrested as well. They were arrested on July 31 and a Howrah court remanded all five in the custody of the CID for 10 days.
Agarwal’s rented office is located at Bikaner Building, an old office complex close to Kolkata police headquarters at Lalbazar, a business district.
The CID has found that the Congress legislators spent around 50 minutes at a hotel in Kolkata on July 30. Officers suspects that the MLAs received the money during these 50 minutes. The hotel is located at Sudder Street, around 3km from Lalbazar.
Instructed by the hotel owner, the staff opened room No 106 so that the MLAs could use the toilet. They stayed in the room from 3.04 pm to 3.10 pm, and left for a restaurant located outside the hotel, and stayed there from 3.10 pm to 3.50 pm.
A man left the hotel premises on a scooter and returned after some time with a bag, security camera footage showed. CID officers suspect that the man on the scooter went to meet Agarwal and returned with the money that was seized by Howrah police a couple of hours later.
The names of the MLAs were not entered in the hotel register, although the time of their entry and exit were recorded.
Ansari, Kachhap and Bixal were charged under sections 120 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code and several sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
The legislators claimed that they brought the money from Jharkhand to buy sarees from the Burrabazar wholesale market in Kolkata for distribution at an upcoming tribal festival in their state. The MLAs also told the police that they were planning to spend the Sunday at the beach town of Mandarmani in East Midnapore district and return to Kolkata on Monday for shopping.
Asked about the trip to Assam, Ansari claimed that he went to Guwahati to talk to a school administration for his son’s admission but the other legislators could not provide any plausible explanation, CID officials said.
The Assam trip triggered allegations of horse trading against the Bharatiya Janata Party, which was accused of hatching a plan to bring down the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha-led coalition government.
The three MLAs were suspended by the Congress on July 31.
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Suggesting that the BJP was trying to undertake Operation Lotus in Jharkhand, the Congress slammed its rival, saying it was Operation Keechad (slime) that was being carried out.
Reacting to the CID raid, Trinamool Congress state general secretary Kunal Ghosh said the mystery was unravelling slowly. “The BJP will be in trouble when the investigation ends,” Ghosh said.
Bengal BJP’s chief spokesperson Samik Bhattacharya said : “Even a common person will laugh at this script. If it is being suggested that a government can be pulled down with a bribe of ₹49 lakh then such a government doesn’t deserve to rule a state.”