Prison official faces court’s wrath over Partha Chatterjee wearing rings in judicial custody

Kolkata, June 19 (SocialNews.XYZ) A senior official of the West Bengal Correctional Services Department on Monday faced the wrath of the judge of a special court for allowing former state Education Minister Partha Chatterjee, the prime accused in the alleged teacher recruitment scam, to wear rings in jail.

After the office of the Inspector General (Correctional Services) on Monday submitted a report to the court on the action taken against the superintendent of Presidency Central Correctional Home for allowing Chatterjee to continue to wear rings while in judicial custody breaching the prison manual, the court expressed ire over the contents of the report.

In the report, it was said that the jail superintendent has been cautioned on this count. However, the judge maintained that the report was not at all satisfactory.

Even the counsel of the Enforcement Directorate (ED), Phiroze Edulji, questioned the role of the prison official in the matter.

"The Inspector General (Correctional Service) should be sent back to the IPS Academy in Hyderabad for further training for submitting such a report," Edulji said.

The next hearing in the matter is scheduled on July 1.

Chatterjee's counsel informed the court that in the next hearing, a senior lawyer will be coming from New Delhi to appear for his client.

To recall, on April 19, the counsel of the Enforcement Directorate had pointed out during a hearing that Chatterjee was wearing rings even while in judicial custody, which is against the prison manual, claiming that it showed how influential he was.

In response, Chatterjee had said that he wore the rings on health and religious grounds, adding that the authorities never asked him to take them off.

Source: IANS