Earlier the Central Bureau of Investigation(CBI) had filed a chargesheet in connection with allegations of fraud in Group C and Group D recruitment in the West Bengal School Services Commission(WBSSC) while accusing the former Education Minister of being the "mastermind" of the fraud.
CBI had named 15 other than Chatterjee in the chargesheet including S P Sinha, Ashok Kr Saha, Kalyanmoy Ganguly, Soumitra Sarkar and Samarjit Acharya.
Chatterjee along with his close associate Arpita Mukherjee was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate(ED) on July 23 while investigating the money trail in the SSC recruitment scam. Th central agency had earlier seized ₹49.80 crore in cash from Mukherjee's flats along with bullion, jewellery and property deeds. In a chargesheet submitted before a PMLA court, ED had said the total amount of seizures amounted to more than ₹100 crores.
According to allegations made by the ED, Chatterjee and Mukherjee engaged in a criminal conspiracy to illegally hire teachers for state-sponsored and -aided schools, acting on recommendations from the School Service Commission (SSC).
The CBI obtained judicial custody of Chatterjee on September 16 and he remained in judicial custody thereafter. The former minister is also in judicial remand in connection with the ED case.
Trinamool Congress(TMC) had relieved Chatterjee of his ministerial duties along with his ministerial berth after his arrest. Chatterjee held many portfolios in the Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government at the time of his arrest including parliamentary affairs, industry, and commerce.
Last week, TMC MP Sougata Roy sought to distinguish Chatterjee's case from other cases registered by the central agencies on TMC ministers and MLAs by saying his case is different from other cases.
He said, “Partha Chatterjee's case was clear as a large amount of cash was recovered from his associate's residence. Therefore, the party has taken strict action against him. But that was not the case for Anubrata Mondal or TMC MLA Manik Bhattacharya because, so far, there are only corruption charges against them that are yet to be proven,"
The Dum Dum MP said TMC has zero tolerance for corruption.
