SHILLONG: The questioning of former TMC Rajya Sabha member Kunal Ghosh by CBI here finally got over on Monday evening while that of Kolkata Police Commissioner, Rajeev Kumar, will continue on Tuesday.
The questioning of Rajeev Kumar has been on since Saturday while Ghosh was questioned for two days since Sunday.
Both are being questioned in connection with the Saradha chit fund case.
It is learnt that Kumar and Ghosh were once again questioned together on Monday. The CBI had brought the face to face on Sunday too.
Later, speaking to media persons, Ghosh said that he attended and cooperated with the CBI in the investigation.
Refusing to make any comment on the investigation, he added that he would go back to Kolkata on Tuesday.
CBI officials are reportedly querying Kumar on matters related to the investigation earlier carried out by the special investigation team (SIT) into the chit fund case of which Kumar was an important part.
The Supreme Court had recently directed Kumar to appear before the CBI and “faithfully” cooperate with the investigation into the Saradha chit fund scam. The court had decided on Shillong as the venue for the questioning — being a “neutral” place — after the stand-off between Kolkata Police and CBI in Kolkata earlier.
According to a well-placed source in the central probe agency, Kumar remained “cool” during Monday’s grilling session. Kumar claimed he had played no active role in the SIT formed to probe the Saradha chit fund scam as most of the probe was conducted “at the police station-level.” Kumar in course of questioning claimed that most of the probe was supervised by Arnab Ghosh, the then deputy commissioner of police of the detective department (DD) of the Bidhannagar City Police when the SIT started conducting the investigations into the scam, he said.
“Just like yesterday both (Kunal) Ghosh and Rajeev Kumar were grilled together. There were some confrontations between them during face to face encounter but both remained cool”, the CBI sleuth said. At one point, Kumar asked to stop the recordings of the joint statement and conduct a narco test on Ghosh, the CBI sleuth added. Ghosh, the CBI officer said, was ready for the test but demanded the same to be done on Kumar also.
The source claimed that Kumar said if he had got a bit more time, the investigation into the case could have been completed.
Ghosh was arrested in 2013 in the Saradha ponzi scam and has been out on bail since 2016. (With PTI inputs)
