Had meeting with Trinamool MPs before leaving state,Sen tells police

The company’s virtual No. 2 Debjani Mukherjee had accompanied Sen to the office,but she did not attend the meeting,it was learnt.

Arnab Ghosh,DC (detective department) Biddhannagar Commissionerate,did not want to divulge details but said they had received some vital information from Sen today.

The details revealed today tie in with Sen’s letter to the CBI,in which he had mentioned that he had been “blackmailed” by Trinamool MPs at various times. The letter reportedly describes how Sen was “forced” to take over an ailing and loss-making motorbike manufacturing unit in Polba near Singur by a business lobby close to the Trinamool government. It mentions that the Trinamool MPs promised Sen a free run in his businesses without any government “interruption and intervention”.

During questioning,Sen also disclosed details of deposits at his two most profitable offices in South and North 24-Parganas. The Saradha Group’s two most profitable “money collection centres” were at Barasat in North 24-Parganas and Baruipur in South 24-Parganas. Sen told police that he had a lot of property,including land and real estate businesses,in the two districts and it helped him to attract more investors.

Every day,around Rs 10 lakh was deposited in the Barasat branch of the group,Debjani reportedly revealed. Officials from Barasat used to send the money to the Midland Park office in Salt Lake in a car. She said that Mitali Banerjee was the director of the Barasat zone,though Sen was the one in control. Later,Sen removed Mitali from the director’s post without citing any specific reason and gave additional responsibility to Arindam Das,who was in-charge of the business in South 24-Parganas.

The police came to know that Debjani had been to the group’s Barasat office twice —- once to take rest while returning to the city from the Malda office and a second time with Sen to hold a meeting with agents.

A retired assistant commissioner of police,Bangshibadan Modak,was interrogated this evening. The officer used to work as the transport supervisor at Saradha and was apparently in the know of how the company’s vehicles were being used to bring in money from branch offices to its Salt Lake headquarters.

Search for property

The police have issued a circular to DMs and SPs asking them to take the help of the public to zero in on Sudipta Sen’s property. The police have already seized property worth crores associated with the alleged chit fund scam kingpin.