BHUBANESWAR: Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Tuesday rubbished Odisha BJP’s claim that Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has questioned him in connection with the multi-crore chit fund scam in the state as “absolute nonsense”.

“Absolute nonsense”, Naveen told mediapersons at Jeypore when asked to comment on senior BJP leader KV Singh Deo’s statement that the Central investigating agency had grilled him. The BJP leader had sought clarification from the Chief Minister saying that there are media reports in this regard.

Referring to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s statement that she would consult her Odisha counterpart before ending her dharna at Kolkata to ‘save democracy’, Singhdeo hinted about a collusion between the two Chief Ministers with regard to the scam. He also wanted to know from the State Government why has it so far failed to return money to investors though it had announced creation of a corpus fund of `300 crore for the purpose.

The Chief Minister, however, dismissed the charge of collusion between him and his West Bengal counterpart. “No one from TMC has been in contact with us for the last one year. Our party’s statement on Monday had to do with the events in our State. We would like CBI to do a professional and non-political job,” he said.

The BJD had clarified that its statement on the CBI-West Bengal police stand-off was in relation to Odisha and the overall issues confronting the probe agency at the national level and should not be used to club it with any political party or grouping.

The statement had mentioned that “institutional integrity of the CBI has to be restored. We are a mature democracy and professionalism should be maintained” and pointed out that there was “sudden action” by the investigating agency just before the panchayat polls in the past. “Now, before the General election, the move by the CBI smacks of unprofessional conduct and is coloured with political motives,” it had added.

The CBI had issued notice recently to two BJD MLAs and former ministers in connection with chit fund scam. Singhdeo also raked up the name of Saroj Sahu, a personal aide of the Chief Minister to corner Odisha Government over the chit fund scam. CBI had interrogated Sahu in November, 2014 in connection with chit fund scam.