Following information that a truckload of important government documents was set on fire by unidentified people, Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officials rushed to the South 24 Parganas area of West Bengal on Tuesday. They rummaged through the remnants of the papers while attempting to put out the fire on a plot of abandoned property in the Andul Garia neighbourhood of Bhandar.
On Tuesday morning, the Andul Garia villagers detected a fire on the ground inside a fenced vacant plot and discovered numerous burning official documents. After getting information about the burning papers at Andul Garia at Bhandar, multiple CBI teams reached the area to investigate. They extinguished the fire and tried to recover the documents.
The CBI’s preliminary inquiry indicated that those papers are connected to mining operations in a number of locations around the bordering state of Bihar.
The documents that were burned may be connected to mining operations in several regions of adjoining Bihar, according to a senior CBI officer. The documents include receipts for huge amounts of money, files, project reports, cash memos, balance sheets etc.
The source of the documents is yet to be confirmed. The half-burnt records are being examined by the CBI, which is looking into a number of instances, including the school recruitment scam in the state.
“Getting information that documents were being burnt in Bhangar, some of our officers went there and collected some partially burnt papers. Going by the initial look, it seems that they belong to mining affairs in Bihar,” a CBI officer told PTI. The officer said that the documents are not linked to the teacher recruitment scam in West Bengal. “It does not appear so. This is, however, an initial observation. We need to examine more. We will also test them chemically to have a clear idea,” he noted while responding to a query about some of the documents being related to the job scam in West Bengal.
In order to conduct inspections, the agency representatives escorted by CRPF personnel cordoned off the area. The documents, reported by locals, were transported by individuals in a lorry before being abandoned and set on fire in the wee hours of the morning. They included checks from a bank and paperwork with official stamps.
There were suspicions that the act was the work of some local politicians. The papers were allegedly set on fire in an effort to eliminate evidence connected to instances that central authorities are looking into.
The plot where the documents were burnt is owned by a Bihar resident named Rajesh Singh, who purchased it from an Indian Air Force pilot some time ago. CBI has summoned Rajesh Singh for questioning.
The residence of Trinamool Congress block president Shahjahan Mollah, who is being investigated in connection with the teachers’ recruitment fraud, was recently searched by the CBI and documents related to the recruitment scam were seized from his house.
The CBI team also questioned Saokat Molla, a TMC lawmaker from the nearby Canning (East) Assembly district. “We would give them every opportunity for cooperation. A thorough investigation will undoubtedly identify the perpetrator,” he claimed.
Rakesh Adhikari who serves as the local panchayat’s deputy chief was interrogated by the CBI regarding the land under his purview. He was reportedly asked if he knew any of the people incarcerated in the education scandal, including former education minister Partha Chatterjee.
Senior officer Umesh Kumar, who is probing cases of coal smuggling, is also reportedly examining the retrieved documents. “We are also checking who is behind this and how these documents are brought here,” the official observed.
Locals asserted that a group of powerful local politicians brought all of those papers to the vicinity and lit them on fire. These leaders are said to be close to Partha Chatterjee, who is being held by the ED in connection with the jobs scam. However, Rakesh Adhikari refuted all of these allegations.
In the meantime, Bharatiya Janata Party has intensified its attack against TMC. The party is saying that since TMC is afraid, it is trying to cover up its frauds.
Something sinister is brewing in Bengal. As per inputs, Govt documents are being burnt in a closed compound in Bhangar, 30 km from Kolkata, for last two days. CBI apparently found incriminating documents, cash vouchers etc linked to cases under investigation… Someone is scared! pic.twitter.com/ADNuLA0oza
— Amit Malviya (@amitmalviya) April 18, 2023
More BJP leaders slammed the TMC, declaring that the CBI will expose the latter’s corruption and that these stunts wouldn’t help them. “Those involved in scams will get locked up,” warned one BJP leader. “Law-abiding citizens aren’t reluctant to respond to any inquiries. However, TMC is undoubtedly guilty of corruption that they are valiantly attempting to conceal,” pronounced another party leader.
Notably, Mamata Banerjee’s TMC has been marred with multiple scams over the past many years. Early on Monday, CBI arrested Jiban Krishna Saha, a TMC legislator from Burwan in Murshidabad district, for his involvement in the infamous bribe-for-job scandal in West Bengal. He is the third sitting legislator to be arrested in the scam. For their roles in the recruitment scandal, former TMC minister Partha Chatterjee and TMC MLA Manik Bhattacharya are already in jail.
