West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee will meet Abida Islam, deputy high commissioner of Bangladesh in Kolkata, Indian daily newspaper The Hindu reported yesterday.
Mamata is going to meet Bangladesh deputy high commissioner amid allegations against her party Trinamool Congress MP of funnelling money from the Saradha chit fund to the Jamaat-e-Islami-Bangladesh.
The Hindu said the chief minister is scheduled to meet Abida Islam at the state secretariat at 4pm today.
An official of the Bangladesh Deputy High Commission, however, said the meeting was not related to the ongoing probe into the Saradha Chit Fund scam.
The official, however, said as Abida Islam was leaving the country (India) shortly they had asked for an appointment with the chief minister.
“It is a routine courtesy call,” the official said.
The meeting, however, is significant, in the background of several intelligence and media reports that have indicated that Trinamool Congress MP Ahmed Hassan Imran had given money to the Jamaat-e-Islami to destabilise the Awami League government.
Media reports have also indicated that the money was acquired by Imran from Sudipta Sen, CMD of the Saradha Group.
Imran, who was earlier interrogated by the CBI, for selling his newspaper to Sudipta Sen at an exorbitant amount, denied any involvement in the scam.
“The amount is properly accounted for. No money was handed over to anyone in Bangladesh and it was duly explained to the CBI,” Imran told reporters after he was interrogated by the investigating agency.
Meanwhile, Imran, also one of the founder members of Students’ Islamic Movement of India, an outfit that has been banned since 2001, on Sunday told The Telegraph: “I left Simi in 1984 and I have nothing to do with the Jamaat.”