In what could further embarrass Mamata Banerjee before her Bangladesh trip, the BJP on Thursday fired more salvos at the Bengal Chief Minister asking her to clear her party’s stance on alleged links between one of her MPs and operatives of Jamat ul Mujahideen Bangladesh.
Quoting national English and Hindi dailies, BJP observer for Bengal Siddharth Nath Singh called upon Banerjee to explain her party’s stance on the issue before going to Bangladesh.“It has been revealed by national newspapers that your MP had relations with one Shoukat a mastermind of serial blasts in Bangladesh in 2005” Singh said wondering how India would react to if someone causing subversive activities in this country took shelter in Pakistan. Shoukat was allegedly a close associate of dreaded terrorist Bangla Bhai.
An English daily quoting intelligence agencies had claimed that Trinamool MP Ahmed Hassan Imran had connections with top JMB leaders. The daily claimed that “Imran and top Jamat leaders attended seminars in Kolkata and Howrah in 2000-01 where anti-India and anti-Awami league speeches were made.” The seminar which was organised by a magazine run by Imran saw Jamat leaders Abul Kasem and Abu Jafer speaking against India and Bangladesh ruling party Awami league.Imran, however, refuted such charges saying he had already been given a clean chit by intelligence agencies.
Raising the Burdwan blast issue Singh said investigations had revealed that one of the terrorists who died in the blast “had exchanged money 18 times during the past two years.” Quoting Hindi dailies Singh also said that Rs75 crore was exchanged between Bengal politicians and JMB and reminded the Government during the past two years in Bengal was run by the Trinamool Congress. The least the Trinamool chief could do would to clarify her position before stepping into the soils of Bangladesh he maintained.
“Mamataji, will you explain your position on this issue before stepping into BangladeshIJ” Singh asked wondering why the Chief Minister was still silent on so important an issue.The Trinamool Congress had been under the intense pressure ever since the Saradha chit fund scam and Burdwan blast issue exploded in its face. Things only worsened for the party after ED and NIA started probing links between Saradha and Burdwan blast.In an unrelated development the CBI probing the Saradha case on Thursday conducted raids in the offices of Asha Agro group another chit fund company. The agency was trying to find out connections between Saradha and this group. Simultaneous raids were conducted in Amta, Ultadanga, Sandeshkhali, Kakdwip, sources said.