Abhishek Banerjee yet to submit asset documents: ED tells court

Kolkata, Oct 10 (IANS) Trinamool Congress’ national General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee did not submit hard copies relating to details of his assets and properties to the Enforcement Directorate (ED) till Tuesday evening, the agency's counsel informed the Calcutta High Court’s single-judge bench of Justice Amrita Sinha on Tuesday.

As per an earlier order of the high court issued last week, Banerjee will have to submit all documents related to his assets and properties to the ED by October 10 and the central agency, after examining the documents by October 12, will have to decide whether it will issue summon to Banerjee in connection with the multi-crore cash for school jobs case in West Bengal.

On Tuesday, after a matter relating to the same case came up for hearing before Justice Sinha’s bench, the ED counsel informed the court that no hard copy of the documents of Banerjee’s property and asset details has been submitted to the central agency till Tuesday evening.

When Justice Sinha asked the ED counsel whether the division bench has directed submission of hard copy or soft copy, the ED counsel argued that the bench directed the submission of hard copies.

“I will have to check whether any soft copy on this count has reached ED,” he said,

Thereafter, Justice Sinha directed the ED to adopt necessary actions as per legal provisions if the documents are not submitted to the central agency within the specified period.

Legal brains feel that the deadline for submitting the documents will expire at 12 midnight and till that time it cannot be said that the division bench’s order has been violated.

Last week, the division bench had also observed that ED will be able to summon Banerjee for interrogation based on its observations after examining the documents.

The court had also directed the ED to get the documents examined by expert officers specialising in handling matters related to Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).