A team of Enforcement Directorate officials interrogated Partha Chatterjee, former education minister, for over two-and-a-half hours in his cell at the Presidency correctional home on Friday for the second time.
Officers had questioned Chatterjee in his cell for close to five hours on August 17. Senior officials in the prison department said the team stepped into the cell inside around 11am and questioned Chatterjee till close to 2pm.
Chatterjee, senior ED officials said, was questioned about some of his bank transactions over the last three years and asked about the source of the money that appears to have been transferred using the bank route.
They said Chatterjee has five bank accounts — two with nationalised banks and the rest with private banks. Around Rs 8 crore remains parked in these accounts.
ED has frozen the amount.
“Chatterjee’s affidavit during the 2021 elections says he had Rs 60 lakh in his bank accounts. We want to know what is the source of the remaining amount,” said a senior ED official.
The ED had arrested Chatterjee and his alleged aide Arpita Mukherjee on July 23 for their alleged involvement in the multi-crore recruitment scam in government-aided schools.
Senior officials said Chatterjee remained evasive while answering most questions on Friday and denied receiving any amount from middlemen for recruitments in state-run and state-aided schools during his tenure as the education minister.
Senior ED officials said while tracking Chatterjee’s and Mukherjee’s bank accounts, they have found leads that suggest that the former had invested in an Odia film where the latter had acted.
While some of the final destinations of the money trails have emerged, officials said they were yet to establish the source of the funds.
Chatterjee has gradually learnt to accept life in jail and is trying to come to terms with it, senior officials in the jail department said.
He has started walking inside the jail instead of using a wheelchair like before and has stopped complaining about his health, they said.
“He is reading books and making a conscious effort to keep well and engage in some physical activity,” said a senior official of the prison department.
“His feet are not swelling up anymore, possibly because of changes in medicines and diet that the team of SSKM Hospital doctors has recommended,” he said.