Kolkata: Additional trouble seems to be brewing for Trinamool Congress strongman Anubrata Mondal, who is currently in judicial custody for his alleged involvement in the multi-crore cattle-smuggling scam in West Bengal.
At a time when the leadership of the state’s ruling party has started giving a clear indication of distancing itself from Mondal, salary payment as a primary teacher in a state-run school has been stopped for his daughter Sukanya on charges of prolonged absence from her duty for years.
She is a primary teacher at the state-run Kalikapur Primary School located near her ancestral residence at Bolpur in Birbhum district.
Sources from the state education department said that on Wednesday the district primary education council passed an order regarding stopping payment of her salaries.
“She has reportedly exhausted all her accumulated leave and is still not attending her duties at the primary school. So, the state government has decided to stop payment of her salaries,” a department source said.
Although they have welcomed the development, the state BJP leaders have questioned why the move has come at such a late stage.
“There had been complaints against her for not attending school for years. Even there had been complaints that the Group- D staff of the said school used to come to her residence with the attendance register to get her signature there. All these were possible since Anubrata Mondal was an asset for the ruling party till then. Now probably such actions are initiated since the asset has turned into a liability,” a state committee member of the BJP said.
During Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s recent visit to Birbhum, indications of party leadership distancing from Mondal became clear as not a single picture of him was used in the different public meetings addressed by her.
Banerjee too refrained from taking his name except once when she said that henceforth she will directly supervise her party’s organisational affairs in Birbhum.
IANS