KOLKATA: India’s financial-crime investigation agency imprisoned a West Bengal government minister on Saturday (Jul 23) for allegedly earning money off recruitment pertaining to state-run schools, officials said.
Partha Chatterjee, who was education minister within the eastern state to get more than five years, was accused of appointing hundreds of educators and non-teaching staff members for money and other types of bribes, putting all of them in positions they were not qualified just for or had these people paid acquire, stated an official of the Adjustment Directorate (ED).
Chatterjee, who keeps three ministerial articles, was arrested on his home in the state capital, Kolkata, ED said.
“The minister has been charged under the procedures of the Prevention pounds Laundering Act, inch an ED public said.
Chatterjee’s lawyer and household could not immediately become reached for comment.
The directorate said in a statement it had seized about 200 mil rupees (US$2. 5 million) in money from the house of an actor and model, a close associate associated with Chatterjee, finding incriminating documents, details of suspicious companies, electronic devices, foreign exchange and gold from the premises of additional government officials from the alleged scam.
The arrest is really a blow to West Bengal’s ruling Every India Trinamool Our elected representatives (AITC) party. Its leader and other users are among the most expressive critics of Narendra Modi’s federal government.
“The party is in no way connected to the unaccounted money recovered from the agency, ” said AITC spokesman Kunal Ghosh.
The probe was purchased after some instructors reported alleged recruitment anomalies to the higher court of the condition, home to some of India’s oldest and most prestigious educational institutions.