Madan to be questioned on Shanku's statements

KOLKATA: Hours after the CBI indicated that they were planning to question Madan Mitra inside Alipore jail regarding certain "inputs" received from sidelined Trinamool Congress leader Shankudeb Panda, sources said the sleuths are also likely to ask for the custody of Rose Valley owner Gautam Kundu in Odisha in a case registered there. "If we get the warrant issued, we might also want to question Mitra in the Rose Valley case there," claimed a source.
CBI sleuths said they have received "valuable inputs" recently from a former Trinamool leader ­ Asif Khan. The central agencies have also dug up information from the state SIT that had investigated the case for almost a year.The CBI said it needs to ascertain if Rose Valley and Saradha had any connection. "While we have been told that Kundu had paid bills for a Bengal minister at five star hotels, we are trying to find out who this person was," said a source.There is allegation that Mitra is the beneficiary . The former minister has denied this time and again.
The first steps in trying to shift the main accused in the Rose Valley case to Odisha by CBI started last October. The senior CBI officials had flown to Bhubaneswar to go through the evidence gathered from Shibamoy Dutta, MD of Rose Valley group and director Ashok Kumar Saha, who were then in CBI custody. On September 17, a special CBI court here had granted the agency permission to take Dutta and Saha on a sevenday remand to interrogate them about their alleged involvement in the scam.
In Odisha, the Kolkata-based Rose Valley Group has duped investors through its 65 branches. Acting on the 25 cases registered against the alleged Ponzi company, the state crime branch, which was probing the scam before the investigation was taken over by the CBI on Supreme Court direction, had raided the company's offices since June 2013. The property identified included 17 acres in Balasore and Puri, besides bank deposits worth Rs 53 crore.
"Once these main accused are brought here, they cannot receive the special treatment that they are expecting back in Kolkata," said a sleuth. Agency officials said they will soon ask the minister about a meeting he had arranged between Sen and Rose Valley owner Gautam Kundu at a five-star hotel off EM Bypass.