Saradha scam: ED looks to crack Shankudeb’s role

KOLKATA: Why was Shankudeb Panda, the state general secretary of Trinamool Congress, paid from several Saradha Group accounts? Was his role limited to media houses or was he part of the bigger game plan of the Saradha Group?
Enforcement Directorate (ED) officials, scheduled to interrogate the students’ wing leader of Trinamool Congress on Monday, have come across several payments made to him from different Saradha Group accounts.According to sources, Shankudeb joined painter Shuvaprasanna’s TV channel ‘Akhon Samay’ before it was bought by Sudipta Sen.
As a media person, he used to get salary from Devkripa Vyapar. ED officials are trying find out whether he had any role in clinching the deal between Shuvaprasanna and Sudipta.
According to sources, Shuvaprasanna had given some crucial leads to ED officials regarding his deals with Sudipta Sen during his interrogation around three months back. Following the interrogation of Shuvaprasanna, some shareholders of the company were also interrogated by the ED officials.
Later, Shankudeb joined another media outfit of the Saradha group and came under the payroll of Pratidin. Sources said that he was getting a salary of Rs 40,000 from Pratidin. “Apart from his salary from Pratidin, he was also getting payments from several other Saradha firms,” said an investigator.
Moreover, investigators are also looking into whether Shankudeb, known to be a Mukul Roy loyalist, had used his political connections to help Sudipta run his business. Investigators have already gone through the log book entries of the Midland Park office of Sudipta and found that Shankudeb used to visit him often.
Meanwhile, Shankudeb was busy throughout Sunday consulting his lawyers over questions he is likely to face at ED office on Monday. When contacted, Shankudeb refused to comment on any issue regarding his involvement with Saradha. “I will reach there on time and cooperate with the agencies. I have nothing to hide from them,” he said.
CBI officials are also likely to interrogate Aminuddin Siddiqui on Monday. Siddiqui, the editor of the Saradha Group-owned Azad Hind newspaper, was earlier questioned by the ED officials over his alleged association with the Saradha Group.
The newspaper, earlier owned by former MP Sayeed Ahmed Malihabadi, was bought by Sudipta Sen. According to sources, Sudipta paid around Rs 45 lakh for a newspaper which had a circulation of around 12,000. According to sources, Siddiqui walked up the ladder fast to become an editor after Saradha Group purchased it.
“We think there were more than what has appeared on the surface so far,” said a CBI official. According to sources, Azad Hind was published from the same building on Market Street, which housed an NGO to which Saradha had regular payouts. The NGO officials, where an MP’s wife was the chairperson, have already been interrogated by the ED sleuths. The investigators are also looking into the call details of Siddiqui to find out whether he was regularly in touch with Sudipta or his son Subhojit Sen.
“We have to look into how the newspaper was run even after Sudipta went absconding,” said an investigator. Apart from being associated with Azad Hind, CBI officials are also looking into any involvement of Aminuddin with the newspaper Kalom. The newspaper was allegedly sold to Sudipta after a Trinamool Congress MP intervened. In his statement, Sudipta Sen had said that he was offered merely Rs 15,000 for Kalom, which he had refused to accept. ED officials have also interrogated Ahmed Hassan Imran regarding Kalom newspaper.