Obliging the Enforcement Directorate with “6,000 pages of documents” purportedly containing details of assets owned, Trinamul Congress national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee emerged from his sixth visit before a central agency since May this year at around noon on Thursday and declared that he had “nothing to hide”.
In perhaps his shortest stay at the ED office at the CGO Complex in Salt Lake on Thursday which lasted no more than an hour, Banerjee wasn’t questioned by the agency sleuths, and only received the documents which the leader had to submit in compliance with the agency’s demands and left soon after. “After perusing through my documents, if the ED wants me to appear before them again, I would be happy to do so,” Banerjee told reporters on his way out.
Banerjee, who was summoned by the agency probing his alleged involvement in the primary school teachers recruitment scam case, was asked to submit the documents in the wake of a Calcutta High Court order which directed the agency to provide details of the assets owned by the Trinamul heir-apparent and his family.
“My legal team members had advised me not to appear before the agency today and send them the documents instead. I went against their advise and came here today because I feel I have nothing to hide. I could have told them that I would appear only after they have gone through my documents, but I did not do that,” the Trinamul leader said. “The ED officers told me they need time to go through those voluminous documents and, after perusing them, they could send appearance summons to me again if they feel the need to do so,” he confirmed.
In September this year, the bench of Justice Amrita Sinha of the Calcutta High Court had slammed the agency for its tardy pace of probe and observed that it was "shocked out of its conscience" after the list of Banerjee’s assets it submitted in court were found to be grossly incomplete. In particular, the court was scathing in its criticism of the ED for dragging its feet over investigating the possible involvement of Leaps and Bounds Private Limited – a company which has Abhishek Banerjee as its CEO and Lata Banerjee, Abhishek’s mother, as one of its directors – in the scam.
While the court found “multiple inconsistencies” in the probe progress report the ED had filed, it came down heavily for mentioning only three life insurance policies of the company’s CEO in his list of assets. Later, the court removed the head of the ED’s special investigation team, Mithilesh Kumar Mishra, on grounds of incompetence.
On October 10, the ED submitted a revised report before the court comprising updated figures on Banerjee’s assets based on a fresh set of documents the Trinamul leader had provided to the agency. On Thursday, Banerjee provided another voluminous set of documents in response to the additional demands of the probe agency. “I have submitted 6,000 pages of documents which were asked from me. I have cooperated with their investigation in the past and will continue to do so in future. I will appear before the agency whenever they issue summons and call me,” Banerjee said.
“Earlier, I was summoned in the middle of my Naba Jowar campaign programme. I appeared. I was called on the day of the INDIA bloc coordination committee meeting on September 13. I obliged. Then they wanted me to appear before them on October 3, but I told them I won’t be able to appear since I have a pre-scheduled political programme in Delhi on that day. Subsequently, they issued another summons to me on October 9 which was rendered infructuous on account of a Calcutta High Court Division Bench order. Then they sent me a notice two days ago wanting me to appear before them today which I have now done at their scheduled time of 11 am and submitted a 6,000 page reply to their requirements,” the leader stated.
“If they have anything against me, let them go to the court directly and establish my guilt. I have said that repeatedly. I have always tried to be high on moral grounds. I have never looked for excuses to shy away from investigation in the past, not doing it now and won’t do it in future. I could have asked for more time to collect the documents which were asked of me. But I did not do that as well. I did my best to collate all documents within a short period of time and handed them over. I have submitted almost everything they asked for. Let them peruse through them and then if they feel the need to question me again, I’ll return,” Banerjee said.