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ED accuses TMC leader Kunal Ghosh, senior scribe of money laundering
For the first time, sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) were added in the supplementary chargesheet the ED filed before a special court in Kolkata on Friday.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday filed a supplementary chargesheet in the Saradha chit fund scam, accusing Trinamool Congress (TMC) general secretary Kunal Ghosh and senior journalist Suman Chattopadhyay of money laundering through their companies, reported news agency PTI.
Ghosh was the CEO of the Saradha group’s media division. He was suspended from the TMC in 2013 for alleged anti-party activities. The group shut down its operations the same year.
Ghosh was in judicial custody for 34 months after being arrested by the West Bengal police in the Saradha case. He was released on bail in October 2016. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which started probing the Saradha case in 2014 following orders of the Supreme Court, named Ghosh in its first chargesheet filed in October 2014.
Chattopadhyay, on the other hand, was arrested by the CBI in 2018 and remanded in judicial custody for more than a year in connection with the I-Core chit fund case. He was granted bail on health grounds by the Supreme Court last year.
For the first time, sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) were added in the supplementary chargesheet the ED filed before a special court in Kolkata on Friday.
Sudipta Sen, the owner of the Saradha Group, is now in jail. The company raised around ₹2500 crore, primarily from lower income group people, by promising high returns.
In October 2014, Ghosh, Sen and Saradha Group director Debjani Mukherjee were named in the CBI’s first chargesheet. They were accused under several sections of the Indian Penal Code and the Prize Chits and Money Circulation Schemes (Banning) Act, 1978.
The ED on Friday filed a supplementary chargesheet against Ghosh, his company Strategy Media Plus Communications, and Suman Chattopadhyay and his companies Disha Production and Media and Ekdin Media with the prayer for punishment for money laundering and confiscation of attached assets worth ₹96.55 crore, including ₹2.67 crore owned by Ghosh and ₹1.72 crore owned by Chattopadhyay, PTI reported. ED officials did not comment before the media.
“I provided all records in 2013. Why did the ED take eight years to file the chargesheet? This is a tactic by the central government to keep me under pressure,” Ghosh said from Tripura where the TMC is trying to build its organisation and take on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in the next assembly polls.
Chattopadhyay earlier served as the editor of Ananda Bazaar Patrika and Ei Shomoy, a Bengali daily. He launched his own newspaper, Ek Din, and allegedly raised money from I-Core. The I-Core group came under the scanner after a police complaint was lodged in Bhubaneswar.
Many heavyweights have been accused in the Saradha ponzi scam in the past.
In January 2019, the CBI filed a chargesheet against Nalini Chidambaram, wife of former Union finance minister P Chidambaram, alleging that she received ₹1.4 crore from the Saradha Group between 2010 and 2012 for handling investigations started by various probe agencies.
The CBI alleged that Manoranjana Sinh, the estranged wife of former Union Minister Matang Sinh, introduced Sudipta Sen to Nalini Chidambaram.
Retired IPS officer Rajat Majumdar, who allegedly had links with the Saradha Group, was accused in the CBI’s second chargesheet filed in November 2014.
