Kolkata: Call it a diversionary tactic to confuse investigators or the desperate bid of a drowning man clutching at straws, Saradha Group CMD Sudipta Sen wrote an explosive tell-all letter to the CBI naming top national and state-level politicians on April 5—five days before his cross-country run.
“I shall be committing suicide any moment because I am feeling helpless,” says the letter, accusing a string of powerful politicians in West Bengal, Assam, Odisha and Jharkhand of taking money from him, “using him” and “backstabbing him at gunpoint”.
Among those Sen has named are Trinamool Congress MPs Kunal Ghosh, former CEO of Saradha Group Media, and Srinjoy Bose, MD of Pratidin Publication that brings out the daily, Sangbad Pratidin. Both of them have denied the allegations.
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee announced that her government would set up a Rs 500-crore relief fund to pay back the Saradha depositors. She plans to rake in Rs 150 crore by hiking taxes on cigarettes by 10%, at the same time suggesting that people should “smoke more frequently”—notwithstanding what doctors may have to say on the subject.
Sen was flown to Kolkata from J&K along with his two close aides, Debjani Mukherjee and Arvind Singh Chauhan, after production before a Ganderbal court on a four-day transit remand.
Police suspect that Sen’s real name is Shankaraditya Sen, a Naxalite who frequently met Charu Mazumdar and was jailed in 1971-72. When Sen walked out of prison, he was a changed man, having replaced his passion for revolution with a thirst for money.
He emerged as land shark Shankar, who roped in some of the same policemen who had arrested him. He then disappeared in early 2000 to re-emerge as Sudipta Sen of the Saradha Group.
Copies of the 17-page letter (that the CBI received on April 6) reached media houses on Thursday, a day after Sen was arrested along with two senior Saradha officials from Sonmarg in Jammu and Kashmir. TOI was the first to gain access to the excerpts of the letter on April 22 and carried the report on the mysterious leak the next day.
From the letter, it seems Sen knew his empire was crumbling and started devising ways to protect himself. The man facing a multi-pronged investigation himself demanded an “independent inquiry” into his company’s meltdown. Sen recounts how Ghosh with the backing of the Bengal media group that he worked with “led the attack against Saradha” after a meeting with a minister of the Left Front government. The Saradha CMD claims that he made forays in the media sector to “protect himself from the attack”. So, when the owner of a Bengali media house offered to sell Channel 10, Sen bought it for Rs 24 crore, the letter says.
Soon after the channel went on air, the Bengali media house represented by two persons who later became Trinamool MPs settled for a truce with the Saradha Group on condition that Saradha shelled out Rs 60 lakh a month to the media house for news support and appoint one of them as CEO of the channel with a monthly salary of Rs 15 lakh, says the letter. They also wanted to engage a renowned Bengali actor as the channel’s brand ambassador for a monthly salary of Rs 20 lakh, Sen claims.
“The Bengali media house assured me that the agreement will help me protect my business from the government because they have a close connection with chief minister Mamata Banerjee. In the last two years, the Bengali media house took Rs 20 crore, most of the payment made by cheque or by RTGS. For the other one, we used to give Rs 1.5 lakh in cash each month over and above the salary to maintain his car and other social work,” Sen writes in his letter to the CBI.
According to Sen, the money couldn’t protect him from further embarrassment. “Kunal Ghosh came with some miscreants to my Sector V office and forced me to sign some documents and letters, which I did without going through the documents. I read and found that they have got me to sign as though I have sold the channel for a meagre Rs 55 lakh, which can never happen. They also got me to sign as if I have transferred to them my Urdu newspaper Kalom, which I have never done,” the Saradha Group CMD says.
‘CHEAT’ FUND BUBBLE BURSTS
Total investment 2,000cr
No of investors 2,50,000
No of people arrested so far 6
MODUS OPERANDI | Saradha got advances from investors as contribution for allotment of plots or flats besides a money-back option. Investors could cancel booking to get back money with compound interest from 12%-24%
THE GROUP | Had over 100 registered firms. Flagship was Saradha Realty India Ltd with Sudipta Sen as CMD. Other functional firms — Saradha Printing & Publications and Saradha Tours & Travels. Most others front companies for siphoning off funds from Saradha Realty
THE NAMES | Before fleeing, Sen wrote to CBI, naming Trinamool MPs Kunal Ghosh and Srinjoy Bose as having taken money from him and ‘backstabbed him at gunpoint’ I paid WB media house 20 crore in 2 years: Sen I n the letter, the prime accused in the Saradha payment default reveals how he “suffered attacks and extortion from influential politicians in Bengal” who also caused “damage to his company and depositors”.
Courtesy:
Saugata Roy TNN
http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Scripting/ArticleWin.asp?From=Archive&Source=Page&Skin=TOINEW&BaseHref=TOIM/2013/04/25&PageLabel=1&EntityId=Ar00100&ViewMode=HTML
“I shall be committing suicide any moment because I am feeling helpless,” says the letter, accusing a string of powerful politicians in West Bengal, Assam, Odisha and Jharkhand of taking money from him, “using him” and “backstabbing him at gunpoint”.
Among those Sen has named are Trinamool Congress MPs Kunal Ghosh, former CEO of Saradha Group Media, and Srinjoy Bose, MD of Pratidin Publication that brings out the daily, Sangbad Pratidin. Both of them have denied the allegations.
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee announced that her government would set up a Rs 500-crore relief fund to pay back the Saradha depositors. She plans to rake in Rs 150 crore by hiking taxes on cigarettes by 10%, at the same time suggesting that people should “smoke more frequently”—notwithstanding what doctors may have to say on the subject.
Sen was flown to Kolkata from J&K along with his two close aides, Debjani Mukherjee and Arvind Singh Chauhan, after production before a Ganderbal court on a four-day transit remand.
Police suspect that Sen’s real name is Shankaraditya Sen, a Naxalite who frequently met Charu Mazumdar and was jailed in 1971-72. When Sen walked out of prison, he was a changed man, having replaced his passion for revolution with a thirst for money.
He emerged as land shark Shankar, who roped in some of the same policemen who had arrested him. He then disappeared in early 2000 to re-emerge as Sudipta Sen of the Saradha Group.
Copies of the 17-page letter (that the CBI received on April 6) reached media houses on Thursday, a day after Sen was arrested along with two senior Saradha officials from Sonmarg in Jammu and Kashmir. TOI was the first to gain access to the excerpts of the letter on April 22 and carried the report on the mysterious leak the next day.
From the letter, it seems Sen knew his empire was crumbling and started devising ways to protect himself. The man facing a multi-pronged investigation himself demanded an “independent inquiry” into his company’s meltdown. Sen recounts how Ghosh with the backing of the Bengal media group that he worked with “led the attack against Saradha” after a meeting with a minister of the Left Front government. The Saradha CMD claims that he made forays in the media sector to “protect himself from the attack”. So, when the owner of a Bengali media house offered to sell Channel 10, Sen bought it for Rs 24 crore, the letter says.
Soon after the channel went on air, the Bengali media house represented by two persons who later became Trinamool MPs settled for a truce with the Saradha Group on condition that Saradha shelled out Rs 60 lakh a month to the media house for news support and appoint one of them as CEO of the channel with a monthly salary of Rs 15 lakh, says the letter. They also wanted to engage a renowned Bengali actor as the channel’s brand ambassador for a monthly salary of Rs 20 lakh, Sen claims.
“The Bengali media house assured me that the agreement will help me protect my business from the government because they have a close connection with chief minister Mamata Banerjee. In the last two years, the Bengali media house took Rs 20 crore, most of the payment made by cheque or by RTGS. For the other one, we used to give Rs 1.5 lakh in cash each month over and above the salary to maintain his car and other social work,” Sen writes in his letter to the CBI.
According to Sen, the money couldn’t protect him from further embarrassment. “Kunal Ghosh came with some miscreants to my Sector V office and forced me to sign some documents and letters, which I did without going through the documents. I read and found that they have got me to sign as though I have sold the channel for a meagre Rs 55 lakh, which can never happen. They also got me to sign as if I have transferred to them my Urdu newspaper Kalom, which I have never done,” the Saradha Group CMD says.
‘CHEAT’ FUND BUBBLE BURSTS
Total investment 2,000cr
No of investors 2,50,000
No of people arrested so far 6
MODUS OPERANDI | Saradha got advances from investors as contribution for allotment of plots or flats besides a money-back option. Investors could cancel booking to get back money with compound interest from 12%-24%
THE GROUP | Had over 100 registered firms. Flagship was Saradha Realty India Ltd with Sudipta Sen as CMD. Other functional firms — Saradha Printing & Publications and Saradha Tours & Travels. Most others front companies for siphoning off funds from Saradha Realty
THE NAMES | Before fleeing, Sen wrote to CBI, naming Trinamool MPs Kunal Ghosh and Srinjoy Bose as having taken money from him and ‘backstabbed him at gunpoint’ I paid WB media house 20 crore in 2 years: Sen I n the letter, the prime accused in the Saradha payment default reveals how he “suffered attacks and extortion from influential politicians in Bengal” who also caused “damage to his company and depositors”.
Courtesy:
Saugata Roy TNN
http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Scripting/ArticleWin.asp?From=Archive&Source=Page&Skin=TOINEW&BaseHref=TOIM/2013/04/25&PageLabel=1&EntityId=Ar00100&ViewMode=HTML
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