On the face of it, actor-cum-Trinamul Youth Congress leader Saayoni Ghosh’s only conspicuous ‘act’ in the last couple of years which attracted unwarranted attention of her neighbours and, eventually, the central probe agencies, is her purchase of two apartments in the tony neighbourhood of Golf Green in South Calcutta.

Many would question whether shelling out Rs 35 lakhs for one apartment and Rs 80 lakhs for another is manifestation of involvement in large-scale corruption which most believe has spread its tentacles in farthest corners of Bengal where the warmth from power corridors reaches. Especially, if the investments come from a working actor in the Bengali film industry, albeit a part-time one, where pay isn’t hopeless but nowhere at par with Bollywood or the South. Would that activity alone warrant a custodial investigation of the leader when records with the office of the Registrar of Assurances and the Calcutta Municipal Corporation would surely confirm that hundreds, maybe thousands of such property purchases have been made in the city by others in that time period?

Unless, of course, the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which is probing Ghosh in connection with the school jobs scam case in Bengal, finds the actor’s claims to be untrue or not backed by documentary evidence. Or… if there’s more to this intriguing saga than what meets the eye.

The fact that Saayoni was summoned twice by the agency inside a week only strengthens the hunch in favour of the latter.

After attending her first quizzing and promising unfailing cooperation with the investigators, she skipped the second, citing political preoccupation. That in itself means a third summons is definitely on the way with the probe agency turning up the heat a notch or two.

What we know so far

At precisely 11.22am on June 30, Saayoni landed at the doorstep of the eastern regional headquarters of the Enforcement Directorate office at the CGO Complex in Salt Lake. “I am here to offer my full cooperation to the investigators,” she said before walking inside the office with bold steps.

When she emerged about eleven and a half hours and two sessions of marathon quizzing later, the brief smirk on Saayoni’s lips couldn’t go unnoticed. “I was in the middle of panchayat poll campaigns for my party. The ED gave me only a 48-hour notice to appear with documents. I have answered their questions to the best of my ability. If required, I can remain here for 24 hours to cooperate with this investigation. I will return if the agency summons me again. I can pay a visit to this office a hundred times if the investigators want me to," she said before leaving the ED office at 10.45pm on Friday.

Nevertheless, the youth leader skipped her scheduled appearance before the agency on Wednesday, reportedly citing engagements for rural poll campaign in an e-mail to the investigators. She left her Golf Green home at dawn and was seen at a campaign in Galsi in Burdwan post noon. Party spokesperson Kunal Ghosh claimed Saayoni would join poll campaigns from Wednesday and make herself available before the investigators after the elections got over. Her name, though, was missing from the official party list of star campaigners for the day.

Curiously enough, Saayoni had remained incommunicado for the two days leading up to her appearance before the ED for the first time. It wasn’t until four days after Friday that she hit the road again for the high-stakes rural polls which were knocking at the doors with barely hours remaining before the campaign deadline drew to a close. Although she has stated her mother’s illness as the reason for the break, rumor mongers weren’t taking one.

The alleged scam connect

Saayoni’s name popped up in the cash-for-jobs scam probe about a month ago when central agencies were grilling former Trinamul youth leader Kuntal Ghosh in jail, it was widely reported. Ghosh, now expelled from the party, is believed to have laundered no less than Rs 19 crore he is accused of collecting from job seekers. In a submission before a trial court in March, ED alleged that Ghosh had collected Rs 20 lakh per candidate and used the money to foray into the Tollygunge entertainment industry and even laundered the cash by buying high-end vehicles for film stars. “More than 50 people received money from Kuntal Ghosh's bank accounts. These people are being tracked,” said the ED in court.

For someone who joined active politics a little over two years ago, Saayoni’s rise in the Trinamul Congress has been nothing short of meteoric. She joined the party in February 2021, a month before she received her MLA ticket to take on BJP’s Agnimitra Paul in Asansol. Though she lost the polls, the actor was elevated to the position of the party’s youth president succeeding Abhishek Banerjee in the coveted post despite many considering her a political greenhorn. Multiple pictures of Saayoni and Kuntal, strewn all over social media, bear testimony to her obvious connection with scam-accused Kuntal Ghosh who was also an influential youth leader of the party back then.

Sources in the ED confirmed that although Saayoni admitted to knowing Kuntal, she insisted it was strictly on the basis of a common political platform both shared. She has, sources revealed, admitted to receiving money from Kuntal for an entertainment show that the latter had organized. But other than that one occasion, she has denied any kind of monetary transaction with the jailed scam-accused.

Payment for apartments

Saayoni has reportedly told investigators that she made a Rs 20 lakh down payment from her savings for her Rs 80 lakh apartment and raised the remaining amount by means of a loan from a nationalized bank. The other apartment was paid for by her parents and is owned by her mother, she claimed. She has vehemently denied having received any money from Kuntal for her apartment or her car, sources said.

Besides submitting visa details of the overseas trips she made in recent times, Saayoni also submitted details of bank statements from one of her accounts. Since she admittedly holds three bank accounts and the ED has asked for details of the remaining two. Besides, the politician has also been asked to submit her income tax returns for the last five years and papers related to her bank loan, it was learnt from agency sources.

In her absence, Saayoni’s lawyers reached the agency office on Wednesday and stated they submitted the necessary documents. It wasn’t clear, though, exactly which documents were handed over.

What happens next

With Saayoni giving her second scheduled appearance a miss, the agency would, most certainly, issue yet another summons to the actor. When and how soon that’s going to happen would depend on the agency’s top brass in Delhi and the legal advice the ED receives from its lawyers. What’s important though is the agency’s change of assessment about Saayoni’s locus standi vis-à-vis the probe: while her first appearance gave ED officers an impression that she was largely cooperating, her skipping the scheduled examination on the second occasion is being viewed as her non-cooperation, especially since the date was fixed as per the leader’s own convenience and at her request.

Bengal’s Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari took the opportunity to fire his salvo and questioned the ED’s decision to let her go after the first round of examination. “The agency has loads of evidence about her being a beneficiary of the recruitment scam. They shouldn’t have allowed her to go on Day 1. She knows she may end up becoming another Kalighater Kaku (Sujay Krishna Bhadra who was earlier arrested by the ED on charges of laundering money from the recruitment scam),” he said.

Add to all this the buzz that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is likely to throw its hat in the ring sooner rather than later to rope in Saayoni to probe possible criminality involved over and above the money trail the ED is looking at, it seems trouble for the Trinamul youth leader has only just begun.