Kolkata, Dec 12 (IANS): In an apparent reference to ruling Trinamool Congress MP Kunal Ghosh's arrest in the Saradha chit fund scam, West Bengal's leader of opposition Surjya Kanta Mishra Thursday accused the state government of trying to "gag" its own parliamentarian to prevent the truth regarding the scandal from coming out.
"The state government is trying to hide facts when names of three cabinet ministers and MPs of the ruling party have been floating with regard to the scam," said Mishra, also a politburo member of the Communist Party of India-Marxist.
"The government is trying to gag and put leukoplast on the mouth on an MP of a ruling party arrested in connection with the scam," he said.
Suspended Trinamool MP Ghosh, now behind bars in connection with the scam, has named several high profile political leaders and police officers among others in a Facebook post and a video footage who "could help in revealing the truth" behind the biggest financial scandal to hit West Bengal.
Ghosh had sought permission to make a confession to a magistrate soon after the arrest, but the matter has been pending since then as police have been taking him in custody in various cases linked to the scam in different courts of the state.
Banerjee has in the past repeatedly asked the CPI-M-led Left front, which ruled the state between 1977 and 2011, to put leukoplasts in their mouth for ten years and allow her government to carry out development.
Mishra repeated the demand for a Supreme Court monitoredinquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the scam.
"The ruling party has been alleging that those from the erstwhile Left Front government are involved in the scam. Then what is preventing the state government from asking for a CBI probe? Why is the State government failing to utilise the opportunity? " he asked.
The Saradha scandal came to light in April when the company closed shop across Bengal, unable to pay back the depositors, mainly poor people in small towns and villages, who had parked their life's savings with thegroup, lured by the promise of huge returns
The multi-crore scandal has triggered a spate of suicides by agents and depositors of ponzi firms.