In an apparent double whammy for the ruling Trinamool Congress, the Central Bureau of Investigation on Wednesday subjected its senior-most leader and MP Saugato Roy to more than six hours of intense grilling and sent summons to another senior leader and Bengal Minister Suvendu Adhikary in Narada pay-off case where they were purportedly seen in a video tape accepting cash from a sting journalist faking as a prospective investor in Bengal.
The professor-turned politician MP came out of the CBI enclosure at Nizam Palace with a noticeably long face and said he had told his interrogators that he would return and cooperate whenever called upon to do so reminding acerbically however that the Supreme Court had referred to the central investigating agency as a caged parrot.
Roy reportedly told his interrogators that he was not known to Mathew Samuels the Narada News reporter who allegedly conducted the sting operation on a dozen of Trinamool Congress leaders including MPs and Ministers. He also denied having taken money from the reporter he is known to have told the CBI officers, sources said.
Notwithstanding his claimed non-acquaintance with Samuel, he said, “I will come and cooperate with the CBI in future” and reminded how “Supreme Court had earlier called CBI a caged parrot,” and added as the Agency controlled by the Central Government “it has to work under certain compulsions.”
He said “I cannot comment on the issue while investigation is on but it has to be kept in mind that the CBI functions under the Central Government before a perspective is given shape.”
There was more bad news for the Trinamool Congress with the CBI sending summons to powerful Minister and former MP Suvendu Adhikary for his alleged role in the Narada case. Though sources close to the Minister expressed ignorance about the CBI notice officials said he had indeed been asked to appear before the Agency.
In not a completely unrelated development viewed as a tit-for-tat action by Bengal Government against CBI-ED proceedings against Trinamool MPs and Ministers in the Narada and Sharada cases the Kolkata Police issued summons to BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma for allegedly posting a fake picture on the Net relating it to Basirhat riots that shook Bengal a couple of months ago.
The summons had been sent by the Shakespeare Sarani Police Station, sources said adding the pictures posted by the person was one of a riot at some different place and was not connected to Basirhat in Bengal.
Meanwhile, Ratna Chatterjee wife of Bengal Minister and Kolkata Mayor Sovan Chatterjee who had earlier been summoned by the CBI to provide details of her and her husband’s assets had sought time to appear as “she is under treatment in England for her ailments.”
She was reportedly suffering from high blood pressure and stomach ailments, sources said adding she had been asked by her doctors in Kolkata to get herself checked up in the UK. The Mayor who had earlier been summoned by the ED and CBI had reportedly told the agencies that he had no idea about his properties which were managed by his wife.
The Mayor too was allegedly seen accepting cash from the Narada journalist sitting inside his mayoral office at Kolkata Municipal Corporation.