Supreme Court Urges Quick Bail Decision in TMC Leader's Money Laundering Case

The Supreme Court has directed a special court in Kolkata to expedite the bail plea of Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Kuntal Ghosh. Ghosh was arrested for his alleged involvement in a money laundering case linked to a West Bengal school jobs-for-bribes scam. The court also issued a notice to the investigating agency.

The Supreme Court has mandated a special court in Kolkata to swiftly conclude the bail plea of TMC leader Kuntal Ghosh, arrested in January last year over a money laundering case related to a West Bengal school jobs-for-bribes scam.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) are investigating the scam, where more than Rs 100 crore was allegedly collected from aspiring teachers and non-teaching staff by some leaders of the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) between 2014 and 2021.

Arrested on January 21 last year, Kuntal Ghosh claims that central probe agencies coerced him to implicate TMC MP Abhishek Banerjee. A bench comprising Justices Surya Kant and Ujjal Bhuyan instructed the special court to expedite the bail plea and issued a notice to the probe agency, scheduling a hearing for October 17.

Ghosh approached the top court arguing that a new judge now presides over his bail plea, despite significant progress made by the previous judge. The Supreme Court previously stayed a Calcutta High Court order that annulled the appointments of nearly 24,000 teaching and non-teaching staff in state-run schools following allegations of improper evaluation of OMR sheets during the 2016 recruitment process by the West Bengal School Service Commission.

(With inputs from agencies.)