Author: Meghdeep Bhattacharyya
Publication: The Telegraph
Date: January 17, 2015
URL: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1150118/jsp/frontpage/story_19351204.jsp#.VLr56NKUeSo

Charity does not begin at home — not for a director of a company that contributed Rs 1.40 crore to the Trinamul Congress.

Manoj Sharma, the director of Trinetra Consultant Pvt Ltd, and his septuagenarian mother live in a room in a rundown building at a slum in Tiljala in eastern Calcutta.

His mother suggested that Sharma does not earn more than Rs 5,000 a month. The address of the other director appeared to be fictitious.

All of which put the onus on Trinamul to explain how it accepted Rs 1.40 crore from such a company, whether it checked the promoters’ antecedents and the source of income.

Sharma’s mother — a frail lady who spoke in Hindi — identified herself as Reshma Sharma but declined to discuss the business of her son.

But she did speak for around 10 minutes outside the 10x12 feet room on Sreedhar Roy Road in Tiljala — the address listed in the company master data section of the website of the Union corporate affairs ministry.

The lady said her son had not been to the room for the past nine days. It was nine days ago that the BJP had first called for a probe into the donation made by Trinetra to Trinamul. Since then, The Telegraph has been trying to independently collect information on the company and the donation.

“Manoj hasn’t come home. His phone has remained switched off. A few days ago, a messenger from the company he works for came to say he was fine and in another state. I wish he’d call me once to let me know he’s okay,” she said, scolding and waving away curious children from the neighbourhood who gathered around.

She added: “He is being framed by his employers. I don’t know who they are. He used to do odd jobs for a small company somewhere in central Calcutta. He cannot even donate Rs 1,400 to anybody. We barely make ends meet with his income of less than Rs 5,000 a month.”

Trinetra, the contributor of Rs 1.40 crore, had made a profit of only Rs 13,589 in the 2013-14 financial year. In 2012-13, it had posted a loss of Rs 4,121.

Asked whether she was aware that her son is the director of as many as 61 companies, the lady said: “Even if he was the doorman of 61 companies, we would have been much better off than this. If he was involved in any wrongdoing, would you see us leading such a sorry life?”

The address of the second director, Sasi Kant Das, is also listed on the corporate affairs ministry’s website: 49/5/3F, Karl Marx Sarani, South Port, Calcutta.

A building does stand at 49/5 — again in the middle of a slum but this time near the Fancy Market in Kidderpore, southwest Calcutta. The ground floor alone has 80 shops but premises 3F does not exist.

Enquiries with 32 shopkeepers on the ground floor threw up replies that they had never heard about Das.

According to the ministry database, Sharma is a director or designated parter in 61 companies with names as evocative as Admirable Advisory, High Spot Initiative for Social Development and Ambition Suppliers. Das is a director of three companies, including Trinetra which claims to deal in investments in shares and securities.

On condition of anonymity, an industrialist cited the example of some jute mills to explain the phenomenon. In the jute industry, some ailing mills with substantial liabilities had been taken over by investors who have made peons, doormen and bearers directors.