Abhishek Banerjee
Abhishek Banerjee faces 9 hours of ED grilling in Bengal teacher recruitment scam, rates outcome as 'minus 2'
Kolkata/IBNS: Trinamool Congress National General Secretary and MP Abhishek Banerjee Wednesday slammed the Narendra Modi-led Central government for "using" the probe agencies to harass opposition leaders like him after losing electoral battles in the state.
After coming out from the Enforcement Directorate (ED) office, which grilled him for over nine hours in relation to the alleged teacher recruitment scam in the state, Banerjee told media persons that the result of the questioning was "minus 2," a reference to the previous occasion when he was called for interrogation. After coming out, Banerjee then termed the outcome as "net zero".
"I do not blame the ED or the CBI for summoning me as the agencies have to please their masters holding the reins of political power at the Centre," the TMC leader said.
"I am clean and have nothing to hide and whenever the agencies call I will respond every time. I do not mind even if they question me for 96 hours but the timing this time coincided with the crucial meeting of the INDIA bloc in New Delhi," Abhishek pointed out.
"We will not sell our backbones to the central leaders and the people of Bengal will give a befitting reply in every election," he said.
Abhishek also questioned the credibility of the ED and CBI as many cases have been pending for years.
"Why hasn't Partha Chatterjee's case still not been decided though he has been in jail for nearly 14 months? Why are the Saradha (ponzi scam) and Narada (sting footage scandal) pending? Why doesn't the CBI summon the leaders of opposition parties in Bengal when some of them were shown taking money," asked the TMC leader, who is also the nephew of state Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
He reached the ED office in the CGO Complex at Salt Lake sometime after 11 AM on Wednesday.
"During subsequent summons from the agencies the results will be minus 3, minus 4 and so on," Abhishek said.
The TMC leader said he was summoned at 11-30 AM and the questioning ended after 9 hours.
"Had I been able to catch the 2 PM flight I could have still reached Delhi by 4 30 pm, but that was not to be," he said.
"Every time I have a pre-scheduled political programme or when it is election time, the agencies target me and other Trinamool leaders to please the central leaders," Abhishek said.
He claimed that the BJP after losing the Dhupguri assembly by-poll resorted to vendetta politics to set the central probe agencies against the TMC.
The ED is probing the money trail of the alleged teacher recruitment scandal following a Calcutta High Court order. There are allegations that eligible candidates were deprived of jobs that went to "unqualified" applicants.
[With UNI inputs]
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