Jobs Scam
Bengal jobs scam: PMLA court orders minister Chandranath Sinha to surrender by Sept 12
New Delhi/IBNS: A special court under Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) has ordered West Bengal minister Chandranath Sinha, who is an accused in the primary teacher recruitment scam, to surrender by September 12, media reports said.
Sinha, an MLA from the Bolpur constituency, is currently the Jail as well as micro, small and medium enterprises and textiles minister.
He has already started applying for an anticipatory bail.
The directive came after the ED on Wednesday submitted to the court a chargesheet against Sinha following a receipt of a formal approval from Governor CV Ananda Bose.
The ED required a clearance from the Governor, who is the appointing authority of a minister in the state cabinet, to submit the chargesheet.
On the court's directive, Sinha told The Telegraph, "The law will take its own course and I have full faith in the judiciary."
After now suspended Trinamool Congress heavyweight leader Partha Chatterjee, Sinha is the second minister from Mamata Banerjee's cabinet to be chargesheeted in the teacher recruitment scam.
Chatterjee, a former Education Minister, was arrested in the teacher recruitment scam in 2022.
He has been granted bail in the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) case related to the jobs scam recently.
Former primary education board president and Trinamool MLA Manik Bhattacharya, youth leader Kuntal Ghosh are among the people who have been arrested so far in connection with the scam.
Former Calcutta High Court judge and now a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP, Abhijit Ganguly had ordered a CBI investigation into the alleged irregularities in the recruitment process.
The higher education teacher recruitment scam has impacted the state politics majorly as first the Calcutta High Court and later Supreme Court annulled almost 26,000 recruitments cancelling the 2016 panel, which was appointed by the School Service Commission (SSC).
The Supreme Court earlier this week rejected the petition to review the order that cancelled the entire panel as the government couldn't provide the OMR sheets to the court to differentiate between the deserving and undeserving candidates.
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