Kolkata: The final decision on the plea filed by Trinamool Congress national General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee to exclude his name from the ambit of central agency probe in the cash for school jobs case in West Bengal will depend on the forensic report of 16 personal files downloaded by an Enforcement Directorate (ED) official from the computer of an office linked to a prime accused in the case, Sujay Krishna Bhadra, while conducting a raid there last month.
This was clearly stated on Saturday by the Calcutta High Court’s single judge bench of Justice Tirthankar Ghosh.
After being informed that the 16 downloaded files have been sent for forensic examination, Justice Ghosh directed ED officer Mithilesh Kumar Mishra and Kolkata Police’s cyber crime division officer Amitabha Sinha Roy to collect the report and copies of the 16 downloaded files and submit the same to his bench.
After that, the ED will submit its own report to the court following the bench will pronounce its verdict in the matter.
Justice Ghosh also observed that since the final verdict will depend on the forensic report, if necessary, the final day of announcing the verdict might get postponed.
The matter will be heard next on September 4.
The cyber-crime division of Kolkata Police took up investigation into the matter after a complaint was filed by an employee of the corporate entity linked to Bhadra where ED had conducted a raid last month.
The probe agency had told to the city police that the 16 personal files were downloaded inadvertently by one of its officials from a computer of the said corporate entity while he was searching for a students’ hostel for his daughter, who recently got admitted to a reputed engineering college in the state.
The ED also claimed that the files were downloaded inadvertently after the raid was completed and it was done under CCTV monitoring in the presence of the employees of the company as well as independent witnesses present on the spot.
(IANS)
