Mamata to act if Trinamool members linked with chit funds

Facing opposition ire over the multi-crore Saradha scam, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Sunday said she would take action if any member of her Trinamool Congress party is found to have links with any chit fund.

"We don't need money from chit funds to run our party. If someone from my party has links with chit funds, I will take action," Banerjee said at a rally here.

Opposition parties in the state have targeted the Trinamool on the scandal, which has been hogging the limelight in the campaign after the Enforcement Directorate recently arrested the wife and son of purported scam mastermind Sudipta Sen and quizzed a Trinamool Lok Sabha candidate.

With the opposition parties pitching for a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation, Banerjee said: "Earlier I respected the CBI. Not anymore. CBI is Congress Bureau of Investigation."

She said the CBI had failed to retrieve poet Rabindranath Tagore's stolen Nobel medallion.

"CBI has failed to complete investigation in Nandigram case, Netai carnage, Gyaneshwari accident," she said.

The Saradha scam - the biggest such scandal to hit the state - came to light in April last year when the company closed shop, unable to pay back depositors, many of whom were from poorer sections of society.

As the company went bust, many agents and investors committed suicide, and protests took place across the state. Trinamool MP Kunal Ghosh is in jail for his alleged involvement in the scandal.