For the first time, the name of a BJP leader has come up in the multi-crore municipalities recruitment irregularities case in West Bengal, as the CBI on Monday conducted raid and search operations at the residence of Parthasarathi Chatterjee, the saffron legislator from Ranaghat (North-West) constituency in Nadia district.
He was also the former chairman of Ranaghat Municipality. On Sunday, the CBI carried out marathon raid and search operations at 12 different locations in the state, including the residence of West Bengal municipal affairs & urban development minister and Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim and the maverick Trinamool Congress legislator Madan Mitra.
The ruling party leadership has been claiming that the raid and search operations are because of the vindictive politics of BJP and the Centre in the process of which the central agencies are being unleashed.
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Now, with CBI raids being conducted at the residence of a BJP legislator, observers feel that the saffron camp in the state will now have a chance to claim that central agencies are not being influenced by politics.
Chatterjee, before joining BJP and becoming the MLA in the 2021 state Assembly elections, had been associated with both Congress and Trinamool Congress. He had been the chairman of Ranaghat Municipality for a prolonged period of 25 years, first on behalf of Congress and then of Trinamool Congress.
He also became an MLA of Trinamool Congress in 2011, the year when the Mamata Banerjee-led regime came to power ousting the 35-year Left Front rule in West Bengal.
However, in the 2016 state Assembly polls, he was defeated by the Left Front-backed Congress candidate Shankar Singh. Chatterjee joined the BJP before the 2021 assembly polls and the BJP nominated him from the same Ranaghat (North-West) constituency. He got elected by a margin of 22,910 votes.
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