The Bidhannagar Police Commissionerate that is interrogating Sudipta Sen, Chairman and Managing Director, Saradha Group, and his associates arrested in connection with the scam involving the Group’s collective investment schemes, summoned Trinamool Congress MP Kunal Ghosh for questioning on Monday.
Mr. Ghosh, former Group CEO of Saradha Publishing and Printing Pvt. Ltd., the company under which several media outfits operated, has been accused by Mr. Sen of being one of those who took vast sums on money from him on various occasions.
Mr. Sen, in police custody, also accused Mr. Ghosh of forcing him to transfer ownership of various media organisations at throwaway prices.
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“My overall business [failed] due to the media entry, extortion from the above named persons [the letter mentions several names including Mr. Ghosh’s] and blackmailed my own staff and executives [sic],” Mr. Sen’s letter to the CBI on April 6 said.
However, Mr. Ghosh said: “There are such lies going around that I decided to speak to officers investigating the case,” though he admitted that it was a senior police official of the Commissionerate who had called him over.
Dismissing all the allegations levelled against him in the letter, Mr. Ghosh told journalists during the day that at the time negotiations with Mr. Sen and Bengali daily Pratidin were on, it was the Left Front that was in power. He was then neither an MP nor member of the Trinamool.
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Later, as he emerged from the Commissionerate, Mr. Ghosh was accosted by angry protesters belonging to the Youth Congress who were kept at bay by the policemen.
Meanwhile, senior police officials investigating the case said they were trying to ascertain details of Mr. Sen’s bank accounts. Of the six cases filed against Mr. Sen, four involve non-payment of salaries and failure to deposit the provident fund of employees of media organisations.
A lawyer representing Mr. Sen said his client is confident that he has made no mistake.