WBSSC scam: CBI submits first chargesheet; names Partha Chatterjee, 15 others

IANS

Kolkata, September 30

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday filed its first charge sheet in the multi-crore West Bengal School Service Commission (WBSSC) recruitment scam at a special court here.

A total of 16 persons, including former West Bengal Education Minister and Trinamool Congress Secretary General, Partha Chatterjee has been named in the chargesheet. Chatterjee's name is sixth in the list.

The CBI's first chargesheet in the matter has been submitted just 11 days after Enforcement Directorate (ED), which is conducting a parallel probe in the scam, submitted its first chargesheet on September 30. In the ED chargesheet, the central agency named six persons, including Chatterjee and his close aide Arpita Mukherjee.

The CBI's chargesheet in the matter comes after 51 days since it started its investigation in the matter.

The other important names in the CBI's chargesheet include the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education's (WBBSE) former President Kalyanmoy Gangopadhyay, WBSSC's former  Secretary Ashok Saha and the WBSSC's screening committee's former convener S.P. Sinha, among others.

Chatterjee is the only name that is common in both the chargesheets.

Trinamool Congress state General Secretary and pokesman, Kunal Ghosh said that if anyone is found guilty of scams the law will take its own course and the party does not have any further comments on this matter. CPI-M Rajya Sabha member, Bikash Bhattacharya said that the central agencies should wind up the investigation process fast and net more influential beneficiaries of the scam. BJP state spokesman Samik Bhattacharya said that the CBI is heading in the right direction.

Recently, the CBI had submitted its progress report at the Calcutta High Court's bench of Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay where it detailed on how marks were tampered at the server of the WBSSC to make room for ineligible candidates depriving the eligible ones. In its report, the CBI sleuths also mentioned that marks as low as "zero to five" were to higher marks ranging from "50 to 53" at the server. The CBI also submitted the scanned copies of the original optical mark recognition (OMR) sheets as supporting documents.