Bengal school job case: CBI takes custody of prime accused Bhadra

Kolkata (The Uttam Hindu): The officers of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) brought Sujay Krishna Bhadra, a prime accused in the cash-for-school job case in West Bengal, to the agency’s Nizam Palace office in central Kolkata early on Wednesday morning. Sources said that the CBI officers quietly reached the Presidency Central Correctional Home in south Kolkata late on Tuesday night and took custody of Sujay Krishna Bhadra. From there, without much ado, Sujay Krishna Bhadra was taken to the central government-run ESI Hospital at Joka on the southern outskirts of Kolkata. After a thorough medical checkup Sujay Krishna Bhadra was brought to the agency’s Nizam Palace office early on Wednesday morning. Earlier, on Tuesday afternoon, the CBI officers had shown Bhadra as arrested after presenting him online at a special court in Kolkata.

His current term of CBI custody is December 21 and he will be presented at the special court on the same day. The court has permitted Sujay Krishna Bhadra to hold meetings with his counsel for an hour daily during his days of CBI custody. However, his counsel will not be permitted to be present when he is being interrogated by the central agency officials. On December 6, a single-judge Bench of the Calcutta High Court granted conditional bail to Sujay Krishna Bhadra in the case registered in the matter against him, by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which is conducting a parallel probe in the school job case. After getting bail in the case registered by the ED, Sujay Krishna Bhadra approached a Division Bench of the Calcutta High Court for anticipatory bail, apprehending his arrest by the CBI. However, on December 16, the Division Bench of Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice Gaurang Kanth rejected the plea for anticipatory bail by Bhadra’s counsel. Finally, on Tuesday the CBI managed to show him as arrested and also get him in custody for further interrogation.