The Enforcement Directorate (ED) probing into the money trail in alleged irregularities in the public distribution system of ration in Bengal arrested minister Jyotipriya Mallick early on Friday after questioning him for nearly 20 hours at his Salt Lake residence.

He was the minister in charge of food and supplies when the alleged irregularities took place. Mallick is currently the minister for forests and non-conventional energy.

The ED arrested Mallick from his BC Block residence around 3.20am and brought him to the agency’s office in the CGO Complex in Salt Lake in a convoy, guarded by paramilitary personnel.

At the Bankshall court, where Mallick was produced later in the afternoon, the minister collapsed while Tanumoy Karmakar, the metropolitan magistrate, passed an order remanding him in the ED’s custody till November 6.

Mallick’s daughter Priyadarshini rushed to him and lifted him with the help of her uncle and the minister was made to sit on a chair before bringing him out of the courtroom to a balcony on the building’s first floor.

Senior ED officers present inside the courtroom rushed to the minister who had by then thrown up. The officers requested the metropolitan magistrate that Mallick be allowed to sit inside the latter’s airconditioned chamber even as a section of those present inside the courtroom kept shouting slogans “shame on ED”.

With Mallick struggling to remain seated even inside the chamber, the judge directed the authorities of the Command Hospital in Alipore, where the minister would be admitted, to set up a medical board within 24 hours and monitor his health while providing necessary medication. A Calcutta police ambulance was brought in.

Around 6.06pm, Mallick fell ill for the second time while inside the metropolitan magistrate’s chamber. It was decided that instead of the Command hospital, Mallick would be shifted to a private healthcare facility on EM Bypass. An air-conditioned ambulance was brought in and around 7.10 pm, the minister was admitted to the hospital in the presence of his wife Manidipa and daughter Priyadarshini.

Earlier, around 4.30pm, when the hearing began, the metropolitan magistrate asked Mallick whether the ED had mentally tortured or harassed him.

“No”, said Mallick. “But I am a sugar patient (suggesting diabetic) and my legs are swollen. My hospital has asked me to walk 10,000 steps.”

The minister’s lawyers later said they had sought proper treatment of the minister considering his present situation and added that necessary arrangements should be made by the central investigating agency.

Presenting its case before the court, the ED said there were reasons to believe that the proceeds of crime — from the alleged irregularities in the ration distribution system — had travelled from three shell companies to Mallick. The lawyer representing the ED said Bakibur Rahaman had admitted in custody that Rs 8 crore had been offered to the minister as loan from the three companies and the amount was never returned.

Rahman, a Calcutta-based businessman, was arrested two weeks ago in connection with the alleged irregularities in the ration distribution system.

The ED claimed that Rahman had amassed assets and properties close to Rs 100 crores when Mallick was also the Trinamool Congress’s North 24-Parganas district president where the businessman hails from.

Senior ED officials said documents available with them revealed that two of those companies had been incorporated in March 2006 and the third on March 11, 2008.

The central agency said it had in its possession a diary, which was recovered from the house of Avijit Das, Mallick’s close acquaintance. The diary with “Balu” — Mallick’s nickname — written on it has details of some of the monetary transactions related to the case, the agency told the court.

Mallick said he was a victim of a deep-rooted conspiracy and Suvendu Adhikari, the leader of the Opposition, and the BJP were responsible for his arrest.

“Govir shorojontryoer shikar holam. Eta boley gelam (Let me say that I’m a victim of a deep-rooted conspiracy,” Mallick, sporting a light green kurta and white paijama, said while stepping out of his Salt Lake house in the early hours of the day.

Mallik was whisked into a car that was kept ready for his onward journey to the ED’s office in Salt Lake from his residence.

Asked who had hatched the conspiracy, Mallick replied: “Suvendu Adhikari and the BJP.”

Mallick is the second member of Mamata Banerjee’s cabinet to be arrested by a central agency. In May 2022, then education minister Partha Chatterjee was arrested in separate cases of alleged irregularities.

A three-time minister and believed to be close to Mamata Banerjee, Mallick is the fourth Trinamul legislator after Chatterjee, Manik Bhattacharya and Jiban Krishna Saha to be taken into custody by central investigating agencies in separate cases of alleged irregularities.

In its statement on Mallick’s arrest, the ED did not mention the exact reason for the action.