In the wake of TMC leader Abhishek Banerjee reportedly contacting the SSC candidates and wanting to meet them tomorrow to resolve the issue, the CPM has said that none of the candidates should give ears to any false assurances and instead demand that the state government make a notification to start the recruitment process.

Abhishek is said to have contacted one of the SSC candidates today, wanting to meet them tomorrow for a solution. The CPM state secretary Md Salim today said that none of them needs to meet Abhishek. “Previously, even the chief minister Mamata Banerjee had met the protesting candidates in front of Press Club and falsely assured them of solving their woes. No more of this drama. The state government needs to instead do the needful to start recruitments.”

With Partha Chatterjee stripped of his ministerial berths, Salim said he was made a scapegoat. “Mamata has to answer. How did she claim that she didn’t know anything when she had already met the candidates before? How did she not know about such huge corruption despite having started a programme called Didi Ke Bolo (tell Didi about your problems)? Mamata herself is the police minister and has claimed time and again that she has information about everything. What happened in this case?”

“This mountain of cash which is the proceeds of crime did not belong to just one person and neither was it handled by any one individual. We have repeatedly claimed that a share of illicit money is also going to Kalighat. Mamata has to answer. How nothing was known by any police or revenue intelligence officers when such a huge amount of money was being stored in several properties?” asked Salim, adding, “How come in the dead of night documents were stolen from Partha Chatterjee’s farmhouse in Baruipur? Why was there no security?”

He said that the chief minister has to immediately assure the state that she will root out all corruption from all the state government departments where it took place. “Can she do that? The state government officials, bureaucrats, and police, all of them need to first guarantee that they will work toward ending such corrupt activities in the state. They need to restore people’s faith. Without this, they can’t expect people to be law-abiding citizens.”