Kolkata Police arrested former West Bengal minister Indranil Sen on Wednesday evening, October 28, in connection with an alleged fake Durga Puja pass case linked to tours marketed using the UNESCO tag, news agency IANS reported. Sen, a singer-turned-politician, served as West Bengal's tourism minister and as Minister of State for Information and Cultural Affairs.
Source: IANS via The Rahnuma Daily
Earlier on Wednesday, Sen appeared before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) at its Salt Lake office in Kolkata for questioning in a parallel probe. Kolkata Police personnel, along with officers from Bidhannagar City Police, were stationed outside the premises during the interrogation. After the ED session concluded, police took Sen into custody and took him to the Kolkata Police headquarters at Lalbazar, according to the IANS report carried by The Rahnuma Daily and Nation Press.
Source: Nation Press
A police source cited in the reports said Sen had allegedly not been cooperating with the investigation, which led to his arrest. That is the police account as reported; Sen's response to the arrest was not included in the reports.
According to investigators, Sen and his wife Madhuchanda Sen are accused of alleged irregularities in the sale of fake passes for Durga Puja tours. The transactions under scrutiny were initially estimated to involve around Rs 60 crore. The probe began after a complaint was registered at Bowbazar Police Station in Kolkata. The ED subsequently registered an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) and is investigating possible money laundering. Last month, the agency conducted raids and searches at Sen's residence and other connected premises and questioned him twice, the reports said.
The arrest followed a setback in court earlier this month. A single-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court rejected Sen's anticipatory bail plea — Justice Tirthankar Ghosh heard the plea on October 15, according to Bar and Bench — after which Sen approached the Supreme Court with an anticipatory bail petition. In its order, the High Court said the allegation that Sen had misused his official position could not be ruled out at that stage and referred to alleged diversion of government money through a tender process, Bar and Bench reported. Sen's counsel had argued that the sale of tickets and donor passes was minimal and that the accusations followed a change of government.
Source: Bar and Bench
In a separate disclosure reported by Nation Press, the ED has alleged that nearly Rs 30 lakh was transferred from Octave Records, a company owned by Sen, to former West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee through banking channels. Sen has maintained that the payment was made as royalty fees, and Banerjee has not been named as an accused in the case, according to the report. All the allegations in the case remain under investigation.