WBSSC scam: Cash over Rs 20cr, 3kg gold bars recovered from Arpita's home

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) officials on Wednesday recovered Indian currencies worth over Rs 20 crore and three kg of gold bars from the one of the residences of Arpita Mukherjee at Belgharia in the northern outskirts of Kolkata.

ED sources said that the counting process is still on and so far, cash worth Rs 20 crore have been recovered from a cupboard at the bedroom of the residence.

"The currencies recovered were in Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denominations. The counting is still on and we expect that the amount finally will be somewhere near the amount of Rs 21.20 crore from Arpita Mukherjee's residence at Diamond Park Housing Complex at Tollygunge in South Kolkata. At the same time, we have recovered three kg of gold mostly in the form of bars and some in the form of ornaments," said an ED official.

On Wednesday evening, ED sleuths, escorted by central armed forces personnel, broke the entry lock of Mukherjee's residence and on opening the cupboard at a bedroom of the residence, the agency sleuths came across bundles of India currencies separately in Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denominations.

The ED sleuths immediately contacted the Reserve Bank of India's regional office in Kolkata for help in counting the notes.

Within half-an-hour, four officials of State Bank of India arrived with four jumbo currency counting machines capable of counting 1,000 notes at a go.

"The counting will take some more time and we hope to complete the process by this night. There are two flats owned by Arpita Mukherjee in this housing complex. In the first flat, which has been purchased recently and was more or less empty, we did not get anything. But in the second flat, we came across such huge cash and gold," the ED official said.

On July 22, ED sleuths recovered Indian currencies worth Rs 21.20 crore, in addition to foreign currencies worth Rs 70 lakhs and gold ornaments worth Rs 90 lakhs from Arpita Mukherjee's Diamond Park Housing Complex residence in South Kolkata.

In addition to multiple high-end Apple iPhones, sale deeds of multiple flats and documents of multiple high-end passenger vehicles were recovered.

Soon after that recovery, first Partha Chatterjee, currently the state Commerce & Industries Minister, was arrested first on July 23 morning and then Arpita Mukherjee in the afternoon on the same day.

--IANS

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