WBSSC Teachers recruitment scam: Trinamool MLA Jiban Krishna Saha arrested by CBI

Trinamool MLA Jiban Krishna Saha was arrested in the early hours of Monday in connection with WBSSC Teachers recruitment scam by Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI) after 65 hours of interrogation and searches at his residence in Murshidabad's Barwan. Known to be a close aide of Anubrata Mondal, Saha is the third MLA to be arrested in connection with the scam after the arrest of former Education Minister & Behala Paschim MLA Partha Chatterjee and Palashipara MLA Manik Bhattacharya. Saha has been remanded to four-day CBI custody.

After his arrest early morning on Monday, Saha was brought to Kolkata's CBI office at Nizam Palace and the Trinamool MLA was produced before a special CBI Court, following a medical check up at SSKM hospital. Meanwhile, another team of the CBI continued the search operation at his residence in Kandi.

While producing in court, the CBI counsel had informed the court that Saha was trying to hide information and had thrown his two mobile phones in the pond. The central agency \informed the court that Saha has tampered with evidence, acted as a middleman and collected crores of money, sources said.


High drama unfolded in Saha's house on Friday as the MLA threw his two mobile phones into a pond adjacent to his house. It took at least two days to recover the first mobile phone, pumping out water from the pond and then digging into the mud below to find the mobile phone today. On Monday morning the second phone was recovered.

The agency recovered several incriminating materials-primary and upper teachers recruitment related documents containing the list of the candidates, pen drives, mobile phone and financial amounts mentioned against the names of candidates.

"While conducting the raids, 5 bags of documents were recovered from bushes adjacent to the boundary wall of his residence. The alleged documents affixed with photographs of aspiring candidates who had submitted bribe money were recovered. It was alleged that the bribe collected from the candidates was estimated to be running into multiple crores," a CBI source said.

From Trinamool MLA Saha's house around 3400 documents, related to primary, upper primary, Class IX and X and admit cards, have been recovered, people in the know told ET.

A teacher by profession, Saha became a first time MLA in 2021. He hails from a business family. However, his father claimed that he had a bitter relationship with his son and was tortured by his son.

Meanwhile, Banerjee said, "We take action against officials and our party takes action against leaders who are corrupt. However, BJP MLAs are never called by the agencies."