Kolkata, Feb 20, 2023, IANS

Kolkata, Feb 20 (IANS): The total recovery in the multi-crore teachers' recruitment scam in West Bengal so far in terms of cash and gold seized as well as bank accounts and properties frozen has been to the tune of around Rs 111 crore.

Sources said that this seized and frozen accounts is the combined figure unearthed by the two central agencies running parallel probes in the matter, namely the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Enforcement Directorate (ED). However, in terms of cash and gold seizures, the ED is far ahead than its fellow central investigative agency.

The maximum cash and gold recovery on this count had been from the two residences of Arpita Mukherjee, the close aide of former West Bengal education minister and Trinamool Congress secretary general Partha Chatterjee in July last year by the ED sleuths, where the total recovery was around Rs 33 crore. Both of them are currently under judicial custody.

Meanwhile, the CBI and ED are currently focusing on the main agent network in the scam, some of whom like Kuntal Ghosh, Prasanna Roy and Chandan Mondal among others are already either in judicial or central agency custodies.

"These agents were the linkmen between the prime brains of the scam and the thousands of candidates who shelved huge amounts of money to get teaching and non-teaching jobs in the state-run school. These main agents again operated through their own networks of sub-agents.

"The tasks of the sub-agents were to identify candidates willing to pay money for jobs, contact them and accordingly proceed. Their targets were mainly the mushrooming private Bachelor of Education and Diploma in Elementary Education institutes in the state," a CBI source said.

Tapas Mondal, who was arrested by the CBI on Sunday afternoon, was the president of All Bengal Teachers' Training Achievers' Association, an umbrella organisation of such private institutes.