KOLKATA: The marital spat between mayor
Sovan Chatterjee and his estranged wife Ratna is slowly getting serious having ramification for the Narada expose inquiry. Ratna, a prime witness to the Narada case in which Sovan is among the accused, has unwittingly given some leads on Thursday that may come in handy to the central investigating agencies probing the money-for-gain case against mayor.
Responding to the “economic fraud” charge that the mayor has slapped on his wife as a ground for seeking divorce, Ratna said: “If I have squandered lakhs and crores of rupees from my husband’s earnings, the
Enforcement Directorate can always ask for the source of such huge money.” The statement may make things worse for the mayor when read with the police complaint
Ratna Chatterjee made around two years ago on June 20, 2016, alleging that the Narada tapes were timed to leak ahead of the 2016 assembly polls to malign her husband.
It is not without reason that the city mayor rattled with his wife’s response to his “lack of trust” allegation hurriedly said: “Narada was a conspiracy. The matter is under inquiry and is sub-judice. Those raising questions on a sub-judice matter are not doing the right thing. I have never told about lakhs and crores of rupees. I only said that my wife used to handle our finances. She has told this earlier also. She used to bring a blank cheque and told me that money is required for paying LIC premiums or such things. I used to sign them,” the mayor said possibly in a bid to cover up what his wife has said.
The mayor’s woes do not end here. His wife and prime witness may also refute the mayor’s statement to the ED that he doesn’t know anything about his home finance as his wife looks after them.
“Why should the ED call me? Did I take the Narada money?” Ratna said on Wednesday to rubbish the mayor’s “special friend” Boisakhi Bandyopadhyay’s observation that there was problem with Ratna Chatterjee’s track records. The prime witness in Narada case then said: “I was taken aback when the ED officials told me that my husband has submitted to the ED officials that I used to manage the entire home finance,” Ratna said, adding that her husband made such a statement at Boisakhi’s behest.
Ratna’s father
Dulal Das buttressed the point further. “Why should a person get annoyed after getting a notice from the ED when many others have got it? Why should he rush to a third person for help if his I-T papers are alright? My daughter doesn’t have to depend on his income,” Das said.
