Arrested Kalighat resident Sujay Krishna Bhadra, who is said to be close to the Trinamul leadership, was allegedly involved in corruption in recruitment of schoolteachers over the past five years, Enforcement Directorate lawyers submitted in court on Wednesday.
Bhadra, 61, who came to be known as “Kalighat’er Kaku (uncle from Kalighat)”, has been accused of sharing names, admit cards and other details of candidates with Manik Bhattacharya, then president of the West Bengal Primary Education Board, to get them school jobs against money, the agency’s representatives told the court.
“According to a statement of an accused, Tapas Mandal, former Trinamul youth leader Kuntal Ghosh was close to Sujay Bhadra, who in turn used to visit Manik Bhattacharya to get ineligible candidates selected (for the job of school teacher),” ED lawyer Abhijit Bhadra said.
The lawyer said: “Bhadra has claimed that he did not know Manik Bhattacharya before 2021 and he contacted him neither in person nor over the phone. But WhatsApp chats retrieved from his phone have revealed the opposite.”
The agency’s officials said the names of 325 candidates from the 2014 TET list were sent to Bhattacharya through Sujay Bhadra.
An ED officer said: “According to Kuntal Ghosh’s statement, he had given Rs 70 lakh to Sujay Bhadra to get his candidates selected for recruitment. Ghosh has also claimed that he paid another Rs 10 lakh to (former education minister Partha) Chatterjee at the insistence of Bhadra. Bhadra has denied the claims.”
The agency’s lawyers submitted in the court that Bhadra was the owner of several companies.
Bhadra’s lawyer, Sk. Salim Rahaman, submitted a prayer for his client’s bail citing his age, ailments and the medical condition of his wife.
“The search at my client’s house was illegal.... Hence, the arrest was illegal, too,” Rahaman said.
The judge approved the ED’s plea for a 14-day custody of Bhadra.