Municipal recruitment scam: CBI raids Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim's house

The CBI raided the house of Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim on Sunday morning. A large contingent of Central Army jawans first surrounded Firhad Hakim's house in Chetla. After that the CBI team entered the minister's house.

Kolkata :The CBI raided the house of Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim on Sunday morning. A large contingent of central army jawans first surrounded Firhad Hakim's house at South Kolkata's Chetla to thwart any chance of law and order problem which has often been the case in previous occasions. Extra cautious security force personnel never wanted to take any chance this time and cordoned off his house with a security blanket and then entered the minister's house.

According to the sources, this raid is related to the municipal recruitment corruption case. The central agency raided state minister Firhad Hakim's house in South Kolkata's Chetla. Hakim became the second TMC minister whose house was raided in a span of three days since Food and Supplies Minister Rathin Ghosh's hosue was raided in connection with his involvement into alleged irregularities related to municipal recruitment scam.

In 2021, Firhad Hakim's name cropped up along with his then cabinet colleague Subrata Mukherjee, TMC MLA Madan Mitra and former city mayor Sovan Chatterjee in connection with Narada case.

Earlier, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) sleuths on Thursday conducted searches at multiple locations, including the house of Ghosh in connection with suspected persons involvement into the alleged irregularities in the recruitments done by the civic bodies in the state. The ED's raid is expected to raise heat and dust with a less than a year to go for the Lok Sabha elections which will pit the NDA led by the BJP against the INDIA alliance of which Trinamool Congress is a part.

Along with a large contingent of central forces, the investigators reached Ghosh's residence in Michaelnagar in North 24 Parganas district around 6.10 am, they said. Simultaneously, the investigators launched searches at 12 other places in connection with the case.