Kolkata :Preliminary investigations have revealed that Arpita Mukherjee, known to be a "close associate" of arrested Bengal minister Partha Chatterjee, had been running at least 12 shell companies, primarily for financial manoeuvres, a senior official of the Enforcement Directorate said on Monday. Documents "supporting the existence of such companies" have been recovered from Mukherjee's Joka flat during search operations conducted on Saturday evening, he said.
ED sleuths also suspect involvement of a few lesser-known actors as well as people from different production houses in Odisha and Tamil Nadu, the official said.
Mukherjee has also acted in several Bengali and Oriya films. "We have found documents from Arpita's Joka flat which indicated that she was operating several shell companies for financial manoeuvres. We have documents of 12 such companies. There could be involvement of people in Odisha and Tamil Nadu, who, we believe, moved the money," the official told PTI.