Bengal: Abhishek Banerjee leaves ED office after 11-hour questioning

Abhishek Banerjee

Trinamool Congress general secretary and Lok Sabha member Abhishek Banerjee finally came out of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) Salt Lake office in the northern outskirts of Kolkata on Monday night after being questioned for over 11 hours in connection with the multi-crore cash-for-school-job case in West Bengal.

He arrived at the ED office around 10.55 a.m. on Monday and left around 10.05 p.m. the same day. Neither at the time of his entry in the morning nor at the time of his exit at night did Abhishek, also the nephew of former West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, respond to any queries from media persons.

Incidentally, Abhishek Banerjee's name was in the charge sheet filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which is conducting a parallel probe into the school-job case. However, he was not named as an accused there. His name also appeared in the charge sheet filed by the ED in its investigation of the case.

In the ED charge sheet, the name of Leaps & Bounds Private Limited surfaced, of which Abhishek Banerjee was the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) earlier. The CBI probe in the Bengal school-job case was first ordered by the erstwhile Calcutta High Court judge Abhijit Gangopadhyay, who is currently the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Lok Sabha member from Tamluk constituency in East Midnapore district.

Later, the ED also made a suo motu entry into the matter by registering the Enforcement Case Information Reports. Abhishek's interrogation at the ED office in the school-job case happened just a day after he faced marathon questioning for eight and a half hours on Sunday by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the West Bengal Police in relation to the ongoing probe in the signature mismatch case.

Again, on June 16, Tuesday, he will have to appear at the CID headquarters at Bhabani Bhaban in South Kolkata for questioning in connection with an FIR registered against him, where he has been accused of inciting violence and threatening Union Home Minister Amit Shah before the recently concluded Assembly polls in the state. The CID officials served him a notice on the evening of June 12.

Abhishek Banerjee has already said that he would fully cooperate with any investigative agency in any case, as he has been doing.

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