CM Mamata Banerjee (File Photo)

KOLKATA: The CBI on Thursday knocked on the doors of Manik Majumdar, one of Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee ’s longest-serving aides.

The CBI move came less than 48 hours after BJP national president Amit Shah, while addressing a rally in Contai on Tuesday, alleged that some of CM Banerjee’s paintings were “bought by Ponzi firm runners”. The CM’s rebuttal came within a day; addressing a rally in Rampurhut in Birbhum on Wednesday, she dared Shah to prove the charges or quit politics.

Thursday’s CBI visit to Majumdar’s residence, is — geographically speaking — the closest the central agency has come to the CM’s Harish Chatterjee Street home; less than a kilometre separates the two Kalighat addresses.

“Yes, the CBI visited my residence,” Majumdar told TOI a couple of hours after the CBI visit. “I have not been keeping well for some time. But they did not cause me any inconvenience,” he added. Asked about the reason for the CBI’s visit, Majumdar counter-questioned: “Do these people need a reason to come?”

Later, inaugurating the Kolkata book fair, Banerjee said sarcastically, that she too might be questioned for earning “crores” from the paintings of the calendar designed by her and released at the fair.

Last month, the CBI had sent notices to senior party MPs Derek O’Brien and Subrata Bakshi as part of its ongoing probe to trace the money trail allegedly linking several Ponzi schemes.

CM: I live off royalty my books earn

Chief minister Banerjee inaugurated the Kolkata International Book Fair at Salt Lake’s Central Park on Thursday evening, a few hours after the central agency visited Majumdar’s home. She did not go into specifics of the case in her speech but said, sarcastically, that she too might be questioned for earning “crores” from the paintings that adorned the 12 pages of a calendar designed by her and released at the fair.

“I don’t mind such questions. I might even send a few of my paintings and books to them as gifts,” she said. “I live off the royalty my books earn,” she said, adding that she did not draw any salary from Parliament (when she was an MP) or from the state government or the Bengal Assembly.

CBI insiders indicated their visit to Majumdar’s residence and their notices to Trinamool MPs O’Brien and Bakshi were part of an attempt to link the Ponzi firms and the paintings and their sale proceeds with Trinamool Congress mouthpiece Jago Bangla.

TMC spokesperson and Rajya Sabha MP O’Brien was summoned in his capacity as the publisher of Jago Bangla, they said. Party national secretary and Lok Sabha MP Bakshi and Majumdar were signatories to Jago Bangla bank accounts, the CBI officials added, explaining why all three were served notices.

The CBI has claimed that two exhibitions, where some of Banerjee’s paintings were sold, were organised by Jago Bangla. The agency seized several of these paintings last December.

Majumdar was summoned by the central agency in December itself; but the first intimation was sent to “a Harish Chatterjee Street address” instead of his home and, therefore, went back to the CBI office. “Majumdar is an elderly person. He then requested us to visit his residence because of his health condition. This is nothing unusual,” a CBI official said, adding the team on Thursday stayed at Majumdar’s residence for more than an hour and recorded his statement.

O’Brien and Bakshi, too, got summons in December 2018. O’Brien told the CBI of his inability to visit the CBI office because Parliament was in session; Bakshi visited the CBI office on December 10. “We don’t fear the CBI,” O’Brien told TOI. Bakshi could not be reached for his comment.

