Bengal CID questions BJP’s ex-MP Arjun Singh in 2020 civic body case

KOLKATA: The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the West Bengal police questioned Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) former Lok Sabha member Arjun Singh for four hours on Thursday in connection with an alleged tender scam that took place when he was a Trinamool Congress (TMC) legislator.
“The police complaint was lodged in 2020, months after I joined the BJP. When I returned to TMC (in May 2022) nobody talked about the case. TMC called me a good boy. They are harassing me again for political reasons,” Singh, who returned to BJP in March 2024 after TMC denied him a Lok Sabha ticket, said while leaving the CID office in Kolkata.
Claiming that the amount of ₹4 crore involved in the tender scam was too paltry a sum for a man of his stature, Singh alleged that the TMC government had smuggled in a lethal chemical from Russia to kill him and Suvendu Adhikari, the leader of the opposition in the state legislative assembly.
“My company spends ₹40 crore on salaries of employees. Do you think ₹4 crore matters to Arjun Singh? ₹400 crore would have at least sounded better,” Singh said.
“I have specific information that state agencies have smuggled in a chemical from Russia. Anyone who touches it will die of multi-organ failure in four months. If I die of multi-organ failure in four months, the government and the CID should be held accountable,” Singh, 62, added.
“I carried my own bottle of water today. I asked the CID officers to give me a photo of the chair I used but they refused. I will undergo a medical test to see if there is any trace of any chemical in my body,” he said.
Singh had also moved the Calcutta high court after CID summoned him.
“The court directed the CID not to question me for more than four hours. I will come again if the court directs me,” he said.
No CID official commented on Singh’s allegations.
Singh was a four-time TMC legislator from Bhatpara in North 24 Parganas district before he joined the BJP and wrested the local Barrackpore Lok Sabha seat in 2019 general elections from the TMC’s sitting MP Dinesh Trivedi in 2019. Singh contested again from the Barrackpore seat but lost to TMC’s Partha Bhowmick earlier this year.
The first information report (FIR) in the economic offence case was lodged at the Bhatpara police station in July 2020. It also alleged financial irregularities at Bhatpara municipality and a local cooperative bank involving about ₹11 crore. Police complaints were filed in these cases as well.
Singh was chairman of the Bhatpara municipality from 2010 to 2019. He also headed the bank’s board.
Somnath Shyam, the current TMC MLA from Jagatdal and Singh’s arch rival, alleged that the tender being investigated by the CID was allotted to a company owned by Singh’s son-in-law.
“His son-in-law’s company secured the tender. That’s why he moved the high court to avoid interrogation. I will drag him to the Supreme Court in this case. He is talking of Russian chemicals because his brain is confused,” Shyam said.
Singh said as chairman of the municipality he was never involved in the tender allotment process. “There is a committee that meets twice before a tender is allotted. I was never involved as the chairman. Any company can submit its bid and secure a tender,” Singh said.