Author: Our Bureau
Publication: The Telegraph
Date: November 6, 2014
URL: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1141107/jsp/frontpage/story_19008852.jsp#.VF2e0dBzvf9

A former Trinamul associate, who was questioned by the CBI on the Saradha scandal and had embarrassed the party by speaking of overnight riches of some leaders, was arrested this evening by Bidhannagar police in a fraud case.

The arrest of Asif Khan not only broke the lull that was beginning to settle around the Saradha case but also stirred questions whether an attempt is being made to gag a witness who is believed to have had a ring-side view of the goings-on in the party when the default scandal was in the making.

Khan was once known as a close aide of Mukul Roy, the Trinamul all-India general secretary who has been defended in public by chief minister Mamata Banerjee this week.

Bidhannagar police, which had probed the Saradha case before the Supreme Court handed it over to the CBI, arrested Khan in a Rs 8-crore fraud case filed two months ago.

Khan is no stranger to controversy — another cheating case allegedly involving Rs 20 crore is pending — but the alacrity with which the police acted fuelled speculation whether his outburst against the Trinamul leadership had anything to do with the swoop.

The police cited legal orders to defend the arrest but the promptness stood out in sharp contrast with the reluctance to act against several Trinamul leaders who have been accused of murder and other forms of violence.

Khan, who was quizzed by the CBI on two occasions, had created a flutter in the party while leaving the central agency’s Salt Lake office. He had said everyone whose name had cropped up in connection with the scam should face the CBI and clear their names.

Later, Khan had told a television channel that he had seen some “leaders going to sleep without food but now they command assets worth Rs 500 crore to Rs 1,000 crore”.

Asked about Khan’s arrest, K.P. Barui, deputy commissioner, detective department, Bidhannagar police, said: “A complaint of fraud was registered against him with New Town police station in September. One Rajaram Sharaf alleged that he was falsely promised a plot of land in New Town area against a payment of Rs 8 crore.”

Barui added that Khan had failed to turn up twice despite being summoned by the police after which the matter was referred to the court. “We just executed the arrest warrant issued by the Barasat court and arrested him from Tiljala area. He will be produced before the Barasat court tomorrow,” Barui said.

Khan, who was the Trinamul observer for Uttar Pradesh for the Lok Sabha polls, had been questioned by the CBI as he had taken over two publications of the Saradha Group — Aajker Kalam and Azad Hind — after Saradha owner Sudipta Sen stopped funding them.

CBI sources had said they were trying to get from Khan details of Sen’s media and other businesses and his alleged links with the ruling establishment.

A police officer not connected with the Saradha case expressed surprise at Khan’s arrest. “There was an impression that he was in CBI safe custody in Delhi as he was a key witness in the Saradha case. Then, why did he come to Tiljala as the police are saying?” the officer wondered.

“Khan had evidently turned hostile to the party as he resigned from the post of observer in Uttar Pradesh. The CBI may also have found in him a witness privy to a lot of information,” said a bureaucrat.