12 Berhampore/Suri/Kolkata: Trinamool Congress's Burwan MLA Jiban Krishna Saha, out on bail from Supreme Court in CBI's cash-for-jobs case in May 2024 after spending 13 months in prison, was arrested by ED in the same case on Monday amid high drama.
Jiban Krishna's arrest came after he unsuccessfully tried to scale the boundary wall of his house to escape, and then hurled his two phones into a drain. This was a rerun of his April 2023 arrest by CBI when he had thrown his two phones in a pond, which were recovered later.
ED officials, accompanied by central forces, arrived at Jiban Krishna's Murshidabad residence at 6am. Sensing trouble, he ran towards the boundary wall and tried to scale it. By then, a team of CRPF jawans had just reached the back of the house. | Gold Rates Today in Kolkata | Silver Rates Today in KolkataJiban Krishna was nabbed before he could jump over and he landed on the muddy ground with a thud. He was held with mud splattered all over his dress. He later took officers to the bushes behind his house close the drain, from where the phones were recovered. They were not damaged.
Jiban Krishna was then taken inside for questioning, where ED officials went through bundles of documents, including properties of his wife Tagar Saha, a teacher with a govt school. ED officials claimed that Jiban Krishna did not cooperate and he was arrested after nearly four hours.
By evening, Jiban Krishna was taken to Kolkata and his medical examinations were conducted at Bidhannagar Municipal Hospital. He was produced before a special PMLA court, which remanded him in ED custody for six days.
ED officials also raided two residences of Jiban Krishna's relatives, including his in-laws' residence at Raghunathganj in Murshidabad, some 90km from his house. They also reached the Sainthia residence of the MLA's aunt, Maya Saha.
Officers from Birbhum's Sainthia PS reached Maya's residence and spoke to the ED officials. Maya, a Trinamool councillor from ward 9 in Sainthia municipality, said: "ED officers came to my house and conducted a raid. I cooperated with them. They have asked me to appear before them on Aug 28.
"ED teams also raided the residence of cash-for-jobs case accused Prasanna Roy's in-laws in Purulia. Roy allegedly acted as a "middleman" in the teachers' recruitment scam.